UPA Full Form

UPA stands for United Progressive Alliance which is the combination of a number of parties that come together to attain a seat in an election. This condition arises in those situations when none of the political parties during a general election attains a single winning majority. Such a similar situation arose during the general election of 2004 when none of the political parties had a winning seat in their hand. This led to the rise of the Indian National Congress as the United Progressive Alliance by joining more than ten parties under its cover. These alliances of a number of parties allegedly led to the winning majority of Indian National Congress in the election of 2004, during which Sonia Gandhi was the chairperson.

UNITED PROGRESSIVE ALLIANCE:

The United Progressive Alliance is merging up or alliancing up of political parties so that they have a higher strength in Legislative Council as Legislative Assemblies. The United Progressive alliances came into existence during the election of 2004, in which the Indian National Congress became one of the greatest majority winning parties. At that time, Sonia Gandhi was the chairperson of UPA. The United Progressive Alliance was established with the alliance of left-leaning political parties of India. This condition arises when none of the political parties of India gets a winning majority.

RISE OF UPA:

In the year 2004, during the general elections, there was not a single political party of India that could attain a winning majority. This led to the rise of the combined alliances. On the one hand, Bharatiya Janata Party and National Democratic Alliance combined together and won 181 seats out of 543. Whereas on the other hand, the Indian Nation Congress won with 218 seats out of 543 being a United Progressive alliance. From that date till the present day, more and more parties are alliancing together with UPA. However, there is not much of a boom for the party left behind as they don’t get a majority even being in an alliance due to a number of criticisms and controversies.

LEFT AND RIGHT-WING:

The left and the right-wing of the political parties are not very distinctive to each other. Each of these wings have their distinctive role to play. The ideals related to equity, freedom, progress, reforms, rights, etc., are undertaken by the left-wing. On the other hand, the right-wing manages the ideals  of hierarchy, tradition, nationalism, etc. The United Progressive Alliance is the left-wing or the left-aligned political parties that merged together as an alliance to win a seat and attain strength in the legislation.

POLITICAL NUMBERS:

When it comes to the figure in the political parties, the UPA or the United Progressive Alliance, which was governed under the chairmanship of Sonia Gandhi along with the Lok Sabha leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury and Rajya Sabha leader Mallikarjun Kharge, came into existence with 15 parties collaborating with the alliance. The UPA attained a total of 90 seats in Lok Sabha and 60 seats in Rajya Sabha. However, it had the upper hand in the legislative assemblies as it had 1210 seats out of 4036 seats. The UPA had almost six states that were under the governance of this alliance, which included Punjab, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Tamil Nadu,  and Chhattisgarh.

SUB-ALLIANCE AND MEMBERSHIP:

The United Progressive Assembly had not only major alliances but also a number of sub alliances that put efforts into the working condition of this assembly. The sub alliances work at the state level and not on the national level. Some of the well-known Sub-alliances of UPA are Maha Vikas Agadi from Maharashtra, United Democratic Front from Kerala, Sanjukta Morcha from West Bengal, etc.

The United Progressive Alliance has a number of important chief ministers, which included Bhupesh Baghel from Chhattisgarh, Hemant Soren from Jharkhand, Charanjit Singh Channi from Punjab, M. K.  Stalin from Tamil Nadu, etc. The UPA got its efficiency from a various number of deputy chief ministers, which included Om Prakash Soni and Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa from Punjab and Ajit Pawar from Maharashtra.

CONCLUSION:

Indian National Congress became the first rising alliance in the political field, forming a United Progressive Alliance. It was the alliance of a number of parties coming together to win the majority in a running election. In the year 2004, Indian National Congress won the major seat by getting alliances from a number of 15 parties altogether. A United Progressive Assembly is said to have sub-alliances as well, which works at the state level and not at the national level. However, the United Progressive Alliance suffered from a number of criticisms, which led to the downfall of the UPA.