Watch Nidhi Razdan BJP’s reliance on allies in India - video Dailymotion

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00:00More than two months since the general election result in India, which saw the Modi government

00:08reduced to a minority, which means that they require the help of allies to stay afloat.

00:13It's very clear that the Modi government's key allies like the JDU of Nitish Kumar or

00:18Chandrababu Naidu's TDP have basically surrendered to whatever the BJP wants them to do at the

00:24moment and don't really seem to be putting any kind of pressure on the BJP in any way.

00:30Now, that's evident from a string of things that have happened since the results.

00:34Now, please remember, firstly, that the Modi government is more than 30 MP short of the

00:39majority, which is why the 28 MPs of the JDU and the TDP become so important.

00:44First, it was expected that they would lay pressure to have the Lok Sabha speakers post.

00:48That didn't happen.

00:50They also didn't really press for any major cabinet berths for their MPs.

00:54They were pushing for special status for their respective states,

00:57but that was rejected by the government.

00:59And instead, they had to settle for some pretty generous offerings in the general budget by

01:05Nirmala Sitharaman only days earlier.

01:08So they've welcomed that instead of the special status, which has been a big political issue

01:12in their respective states and don't really, again, seem to be pushing back on any big issues

01:19such as exam paper leaks, which has been a big headline in India and something that's

01:23really had the BJP on the back foot.

01:25Now, there could be political reasons for this, local political reasons for this,

01:30because both Chandrababu Naidu and Nitish Kumar are not as politically strong as they once used

01:35to be in their states.

01:37Nitish Kumar hasn't been well for a while.

01:39He's lost his school publicly more than once in the last few weeks.

01:43Chandrababu Naidu too is not as strong as he used to be in Andhra Pradesh,

01:47with other players also coming up in the state in recent times.

01:51And the crucial test could actually be the upcoming state elections,

01:54because if the BJP doesn't do well in these state polls,

01:58then maybe the allies will start to exert pressure on issues that matter to them.

02:03Let's see how it plays out.