TIPRA will emerge likely as ‘Kingmaker’ in Assembly polls 2023

Agartala: The relatively newly formed TIPRA Party in Tripura, led by royalist Pradyot Debbarma, is likely to emerge as the ‘kingmaker’ after the assembly elections in the state.

TIPRA will face a three-way contest for power in Tripura, with the incumbent BJP-IPFT alliance and the newly formed Congress-Left Front alliance.
While TIPRA has ruled out joining any pre-poll alliance with the BJP or the Congress, it has not ruled out a post-poll alliance.

Notably, the Tipra party in Tripura maintains that it will support any other party only if it receives a written assurance on the demand for a separate state of Greater Tipraland.
It may be noted that TIPRA party had won 18 out of 30 seats in Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (TTAADC) elections held in 2021.

Hoping to continue the support for the party in the tribal belt of Tripura, TIPRA is leaving no stone unturned to woo voters in the TTAADC areas and win all 20 seats on the ballot.
20 seats in the tribal belt of Tripura hold the key to government formation in the state, as it comprises 33.33% of the total seats in the state assembly.

Notably, the BJP’s ally, the Indigenous People’s Front of Tripura (IPFT), has handed over a lot of land to the Tipra party in the tribal areas of the state.

In the 2018 Tripura Assembly elections, the BJP won 10 of the tribal seats, while its ally IPFT won eight seats in the region.
However, things took a turn for the worse for the ruling BJP-IPFT alliance in Tripura, soon after the formation of the Tipra Party by Pradyot Debbarma, as both parties began to lose their hold in the tribal areas.

Political observers believe that TIPRA’s popularity rose not only because it raised the demand for a separate state, but also because tribals still revere the former royal family and refer to Pradyot Debbarma as ‘Bubagra’ or king.

Tipra Party has fielded candidates on 42 of the total 60 seats in the Tripura Legislative Assembly.