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Classifications of Political Parties in India

The major ways in which the Indian parties can be classified are as follows:

In terms of geographical spread, there are four types of Parties, All India parties, trans-regional parties, regional parties, and local parties. In terms of orientation, there are parties of left, right, center, and leader-oriented parties.

Among the left there are communist parties and socialist groups, among the right, there are traditional parties formed around religious community and caste. We may further classify Indian Parties in the following way:

(i) All India political parties or National Parties:

All-India political parties have been officially defined as those national parties with broad-based national support and able to win at least six percent of valid votes polled in any four or more States at the general elections to the Lok Sabha or the Legislative Assembly and in addition win at least four seats in the Lok Sabha from any State or States.

The other criteria are that a political party wins at least two percent of seats in the Lok Sabha from at least three different States. There should be a minimum of 11 MPs among the 543 directly elected representatives, thereby giving weight-age to party presence in the Lok Sabha.

(ii) Regional Parties:

The second group consists of regional parties, which represent sub-regional nationalism based upon the common language, culture, and history of a region. These parties try to aggregate regional interests regardless of the caste and religious affiliations of their members.

Their power base and voting strength are confined to a particular geographic area. The following are the best-known regional parties: DMK and ADMK (Tamil Nadu); Telugu Desam (Andhra Pradesh), the National Conference (Jammu & Kashmir), and Assam Gana Parishad (Assam).

(iii) Commercial Parties:

The third group includes those parties and organizations that are exclusive in their membership; that is, they accept as members only those inhabitants of a particular religious or ethnic community.

They seek to protect and promote the interest of that particular community alone, are non-aggregative, and generally mobilize their supporters by appealing to their particularist sentiments. The following parties fall into this category: Muslim League (Kerala) and Akali Dal (Punjab).

(iv) Ad hoc Parties:

The last group of parties consists of those organized around powerful persons or local and state issues. Such parties may not survive very long; some may appear only for a short period and then disappear completely or merge into other parties. The Bangla Congress, the Kerala Congress; the BKD of Charan Singh are some examples of such ad hoc parties