Mamata Banerjee’s resounding win with nearly sixty thousand margin for the Bhabanipur assembly constituency on Sunday, will have nevertheless, reassure her that she can now look beyond her state’s borders. Along with her by-poll victory, supporter and admirers have given her many epithets, some even comparing her with famous warriors or even goddesses every time her name is mentioned. After her magnificent fight back in March this year, when she fought tooth and nail to defeat India’s election champion-duo Modi and Shah; the Bengal Tigress wants more. She is now willing and ready to propel herself as the prime ministerial candidate of the opposition. The only party that is stopping Mamata from even coming close to Modi is the Congress, the same party that is still a cause for some worry for even the BJP. The Congress has footprint across India and still the party which has the potential of stopping the BJP in its tracks, provided it is able to form strategic alliances with regional parties. The opposition parties accept that they must forge a broad-based alliance against the BJP so as not to split anti-BJP votes. Theoretically that is possible since all non-NDA parties are in agreement on this point. The other factual theory is that it is only the Congress, with its pan-India footprint, which can play its role as a fulcrum of opposition alliance against the BJP. However, of late, the Congress has been poached upon not only by the BJP but even other parties that are said to be seeking opposition unity. For instance, the Congress has lost some prominent leaders to the Trinamool Congress. In Goa, veteran Congress leader and former chief minister Luizinho Faliero defected to TMC. In Assam where Congress is still a force to reckon with, yet the handling of its internal affairs and misreading by the Gandhis is slowly driving away many of its leaders and workers. Prominent Congress female youth leader Sushmita Dev then president of AICC Mahila and daughter of the king of Silchar late Santosh Mohan Dev has left Congress with over 500 members and joined TMC. Even in Tripura the Congress has lost its most promising youth leader Pradyut Deb Barman who has formed his own party (TIPRA). It is the same story in Meghalaya, where the Congress is likely to lose prominent leaders and workers to TMC or to other parties. The most psychologically damaging impact was the manner in which the Gandhis humiliated the party’s foremost leader and Punjab chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh. The resignation of Amarinder from the Congress in Punjab could not have come at a worst time. The Grand Old Party’s inability to resolve its leadership issue, its abject failure in promoting real grassroots talent to more weighty party positions, its increasing ideological ambivalence and the well-entrenched sycophantic club of self-serving political deadwood have collectively turned the 134-year-old organisation into a caricature of its former self. The final will be in 2024 Lok Sabha election where Modi will continue to lead the BJP seeking a third consecutive term. The semi final will be in 2022 at – state assembly polls. Congress could have been the best meeting point of all parties to forge electoral understanding but the party is destroying itself and being poached and it’s a lose-lose situation. The question on everyone’s mind is -who will likely lead the national opposition against the BJP?