The opposition in Indian politics was decimated, mauled, pulped after the April-May general elections. But six months after the general elections, the opposition, licking its wounds, is trying its best to reinvent itself and cobble up an alliance of parties which splintered away before they were a conglomerate of five parties that had ruled India two decades ago. The five parties are Mulayam Singh’s Samjwadi Party (SP), Lalu Prasad’s Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD, Om Prakash Chautala’s Indian National Lok Dal (INLD), Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal United (JD-U) and Deve Gowda’s Janata Dal Secular (JD-S).

These are radically changed times for Indian politics and Indian opposition parties are increasingly feeling the heat from the one-man army of Narendra Modi that the BJP has unleashed against them. The five regional parties named above have realized that they cannot stem the onslaught of the Modi juggernaut and therefore they have decided to close ranks. In effect, this means Modi versus the rest!

But then this is not the time to go on egotistical trips. This is not the time for anti-Modi, anti-BJP parties to continue to split hairs to determine their political losses — why they lost to the Modi-led BJP in the last general elections.

Instead, from the opposition perspective, this is the time for the opposition to forge political alliances

From Modi government’s perspective, the BJP would like to continue their victory march and capture more and more states so that the ruling party at the center improves its tally in the Rajya Sabha, the House of Elders, where the BJP is in a minority. It is essential for the BJP to have majority in both houses of parliament to implement its ambitious reforms agenda. But that will take two years more when the next set of biennial elections in Rajya Sabha fall due. Till then the BJP will have to continue with its electoral victories in state assemblies. It is a tall order indeed.

The trend of the Indian opposition parties re-grouping and re-inventing themselves to take on the Modi juggernaut is not limited to above-mentioned regional parties only. Regional satraps in two more Indian states like Tamil Nadu and West Bengal are also mulling working coalitions to keep BJP in check in these states. The case of West Bengal is rather queer. Mamata Banerjee, chief minister of West Bengal and leader of the ruling regional party Trinamool Congress, has dropped hints of cobbling up a political unanimity of sorts among the non-BJP parties in the state. These parties include the Congress and the Left Front, which ruled the state for 34 years.

Trinamool Congress and the Left parties are sworn enemies and have often engaged in bloody battles across the state resulting in deaths of scores of political workers on both sides of the political spectrum. The BJP’s popularity in West Bengal has been growing at a phenomenal rate. Assembly polls are due in West Bengal by May 2016. All non-BJP parties in the state have realized that Modi’s BJP is the biggest threat and hence they are now mulling over forging some sort of political understanding. This was unthinkable earlier but Modi’s resurgence has made it possible.

The biggest transformational story perhaps pertains to India’s Grand Old Party, the Congress, which was reduced to an all-time low figure of just 44 seats in the 543 parliamentary elections. The Congress party is continuing to run like a headless chicken. It is unlikely to do well in the ongoing Jammu and Kashmir assembly polls while in Jharkhand also the signals are not very encouraging. Results for assembly polls in both these states would be out on Dec. 23.

The next challenge for the Congress would be Delhi assembly elections, likely to be held in February-March 2015. But as of now there are no indications of a massive turn around in popularity of Congress in Delhi.

To recover lost ground, Rahul Gandhi, the biggest leader of the Congress party today, is showing signs of donning a new avatar. Rahul is becoming more vocal. His political statements have become more frequent and forceful. He has become more pro-active in parliament, an example of which was seen last week when he joined other parliamentarians in sporting a black cloth over his mouth to show that the Modi government is gagging the opposition.

In his decade-long political career, Rahul is seen as a gentle, self-effacing kind of a leader who is no match for the likes of Modi. This image of Rahul Gandhi proved to be his and his party’s undoing in the last general elections. But now the Congress vice president appears to be reinventing himself. It would be a big thing for the Indian opposition if Rahul emerges as a more assertive and hands-on leader.

An image makeover by Rahul Gandhi promises to be an important work in progress for the Indian opposition. But then proof of the pudding is in the eating.

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The writer is a New Delhi-based independent journalist and a political commentator who tweets @Kishkindha.