Deadly rally, deleted video, 90L 'ghosts' & fish: Inside the high-octane chaos of 2026 poll campaign

The particulate has yet settled connected the EVMs crossed 5 chiseled corners of India. From the rain-washed thenar groves of Kerala to the tea-stained hills of Assam, the 2026 Assembly Elections person been a marathon of high-decibel rhetoric, shifting loyalties, and a digital-age makeover of the classical Indian padyatra.While the results stay locked successful the strongrooms until counting time connected May 4, the run itself has already written a communicative of an India successful transition—where determination pride, payment economics, and the "star power" of caller entrants collided successful a spectacular show of antiauthoritarian fervor.

Tamil Nadu’s biggest entry

Before a azygous ballot was cast, Tamil Nadu's 2026 predetermination was already marked by calamity and it formed a shadiness implicit everything that followed.On 27 September 2025, Vijay, Tamil cinema's reigning megastar and laminitis of the two-year-old Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK), held a rally successful Karur. He was expected to get astir noon. He arrived much than six hours late. By then, tens of thousands of radical had packed a venue permitted for 10,000. When his convoy yet appeared, the assemblage surged. Then again. Then again. Forty-one radical were killed. The dormant included children.

Tamil Nadu had not seen a decease toll similar that astatine a governmental rally successful surviving memory.cTVK leaders were booked for culpable homicide. The CBI was called in. The run that was expected to denote Vijay arsenic Tamil Nadu's large governmental disruptor had alternatively produced its darkest pre-election moment.And yet, due to the fact that this is Tamil Nadu, and due to the fact that Vijay is Vijay, the crowds kept coming.Sources wrong the enactment said Vijay had go highly cautious astir attending ample nationalist gatherings pursuing the Karur tragedy. Several scheduled events were cancelled contempt predetermination permissions being granted. In Tiruverumbur, a TVK campaigner campaigned with a Vijay cut-out. In Kolathur, different utilized a lookalike to pull crowds. The DMK, sensing weakness, pounced. Deputy Chief curate Udhayanidhi Stalin mocked the constricted docket openly, describing the attack arsenic a "work-from-home" campaign.The support battles became their ain subplot. With little than a period to spell for polling, TVK applied for a rally astatine Perambur's Mullai Nagar junction. On the eve of the event, Chennai Corporation officials allegedly dug pits astatine the venue and erected robust barriers, rendering the tract unusable. A constabulary inspection concluded the determination couldn't accommodate 3,000 people. Vijay condemned the crook of events furiously, calling it a "fascist onslaught connected democracy" and accusing definite officials of colluding to disrupt the rally.

The DMK called it regular administration. Nobody believed either broadside entirely.Vijay chose to personally contention from Perambur — the constituency wherever helium grew up — and from Tiruchirappalli East, some seats presently held by the DMK with comfy margins. TVK leaders framed this arsenic a marker of assurance alternatively than caution. The sitting MLA successful Tiruchirappalli East dismissed Vijay arsenic a non-factor. The voters, it seemed, had not got the memo.

Assam: ‘Point-blank shot’

In Assam, the defining run infinitesimal wasn't a rally oregon a speech. It was an 18-second clip that the ruling enactment posted, deleted, and then, successful an enactment of bonzer brazenness, partially brought back.On February 7, the BJP's Assam portion shared a video connected X that showed main curate Himanta Biswa Sarma symbolically shooting Muslims. The clip contained what looked similar existent footage of Sarma wielding an aerial rifle, interspersed with AI-generated images of 2 individuals successful skullcaps and beards being changeable at.

The station was captioned "Point blank shot." Before it disappeared from the platform, the video had amassed implicit a cardinal views.Congress called it a telephone to wide violence. The CPI and CPM went to the Supreme Court. When asked successful the authorities assembly astir his discriminatory policies, Sarma was characteristically unrepentant- "I volition instrumentality sides. Won't fto 'Miya' Muslims instrumentality implicit Assam.""In a rickshaw, if the fare is Rs 5, springiness them Rs 4. Only if they look troubles volition they permission Assam."

Defending the remarks subsequently, Sarma insisted helium was referring to amerciable immigrants from Bangladesh.His authorities simultaneously announced a argumentation of arms licences for natives successful distant areas. When asked if this risked turning Assam explosive, his reply was direct, "I privation the concern successful Assam to beryllium explosive."The peculiar irony astatine the bosom of this communicative is that Sarma is an improbable extremist. When helium was sworn successful arsenic Assam's main curate successful 2021, cipher could person pointed to an ideological biography that predicted what followed.

He had served 3 consecutive presumption connected a Congress summons and been a curate successful the Tarun Gogoi government, holding portfolios ranging from wellness to concern to agriculture. He had nary heavy roots successful the RSS. By the measurement of the question helium yet joined, helium was a latecomer. And yet, since joining the BJP successful 2015, his rhetoric has regularly outpaced that of galore politicians with lifelong Sangh Parivar roots.

Woven into the Assam run was besides the sanction of

Zubeen Garg

.Garg, 52, was the state's astir beloved singer, a dependable that had travelled good beyond language, into the regular beingness of the Northeast. On September 19, 2025, helium died portion swimming disconnected an land successful Singapore. A coroner's tribunal determination called it accidental drowning. Sarma did not judge that. He claimed Garg was "murdered arsenic portion of a conspiracy.”Congress saw the opening and took it. It promised voters justness successful Garg's decease wrong 100 days of coming to power.

Sarma pushed back- the judiciary, helium said, was not a run promise, and nary enactment could warrant a tribunal result connected an predetermination timeline. But successful Assam, wherever Garg's songs were little amusement than memory, that benignant of correctness had constricted reach.

The 90 lakh question

In West Bengal, the astir bonzer fig of the run play wasn't a spot projection oregon a vote-share figure. It was 90 lakh — the fig of voters erased from the electoral rolls earlier a azygous ballot was cast.The Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls resulted successful adjacent to 90 lakh names being removed from West Bengal's elector lists, galore of them concentrated successful borderline areas and non-elite rural, caste, and minority-heavy districts. Of those who filed appeals, astir 27 lakh individuals sought restoration of their voting rights. Just astir 1,400 voters were really capable to unafraid alleviation done the tribunals acceptable up to reappraisal cases — leaving astir each applicants without restoration.1,400 retired of 27 lakh. The TMC said the workout risked disenfranchising genuine voters. The BJP said it was a indispensable correction of bogus entries and names of amerciable migrants. The substance went to court. Against this backdrop, West Bengal recorded its highest-ever elector turnout. The archetypal signifier saw a 92.8% turnout, a record, arriving aft the 90-lakh simplification successful the elector rotation earlier successful the year. Mamata Banerjee

, seeking a 4th consecutive term, delivered 1 of the most-quoted lines of the full predetermination season.

At a rally successful Kolkata's Chowringhee, she said: "Remember this, you cannot decision us. We combat against injustice; we combat for our rights. I was calved successful Bengal, and I shall respire my past successful this precise Bengal. I volition instrumentality implicit Delhi erstwhile I person secured triumph successful Bengal. I volition bash truthful by rallying each the governmental parties together.

I won't privation the spot of power; I privation the implicit dismantling of the BJP successful Delhi." Amit Shah, campaigning successful Kolkata astatine the aforesaid time, responded with a laugh, saying she had thing near successful Bengal, truthful however would she spell to Delhi.

The speech dominated headlines for days.

Fish, individuality and governmental theatre

But if 1 representation captured the texture of West Bengal's 2026 run much vividly than immoderate code oregon slogan, it was a fish.Koustav Bagchi, a lawyer-turned-politician and the BJP's campaigner from Barrackpore, moved from doorway to doorway successful crisp achromatic and reddish accepted attire, a food successful hand. Drums thudded down him arsenic supporters chanted his name. A fewer kilometres distant successful Kolkata's larboard area, different BJP candidate, Rakesh Singh, staged a akin spectacle, dressed for effect and flanked by enactment workers, hoisting a food repeatedly arsenic helium moved done early-morning crowds, taking connected metropolis politician Firhad Hakim successful 1 of the state's high-profile contests.In Bengal, food is much than food. It is the bloodstream of the cuisine. In 2026, that resonance was being staged arsenic governmental theatre, with candidates brandishing it to quell a precise circumstantial anxiety.

The anxiousness had been created by Mamata Banerjee herself. At a rally successful Basirhat's Swarupnagar, she tore into what she called the BJP's food "lies", saying Bengal "eats up what it produces," and questioned the saffron party's soundlessness connected the "targeting of nutrient and food shops" if it was specified a large instrumentality of the aquatic vertebrate.

"In their states, they volition not let you to devour fish, nutrient and eggs. Who are they to determine what radical volition eat?" she thundered.

She besides reminded the assemblage of however "people are tortured and lynched successful BJP-governed states for speaking successful Bengali."The BJP scrambled to reply connected its ain terms. BJP MP Anurag Thakur participated successful a nationalist amusement of eating food during a canvass campaign. Seen eating food and nutrient with enactment workers astatine a section edifice successful Kolkata, helium said: "The BJP has Chief Ministers successful 16 states.

There, radical tin devour immoderate they privation and they tin signifier whichever religion they want. We bash not privation to enforce restrictions connected nutrient oregon religion." He past accused Banerjee of spreading misinformation to malign his party's image.From PM Modi to Amit Shah, the food statement reached the run speeches of adjacent the apical brass of the BJP arsenic they tried to shed their "outsider" and "vegetarian" representation successful Bengal. The run had reduced, astatine 1 level, to a contention implicit who could much convincingly assertion the close to a sheet of hilsa.

Triangular tussle successful God's ain country

Kerala has had a elemental governmental regularisation since 1982: Left wins, Left loses. Congress wins, Congress loses. Swap. Repeat. Pinarayi Vijayan broke it successful 2021 by winning 2 presumption successful a row. In 2026, helium was going for 3 — thing nary Kerala authorities has ever done.That was 1 story. The bigger communicative connected the run way was the BJP. For the archetypal clip successful the state's governmental history, a beardown three-way contention was disposable successful astir each constituency.

Unlike erstwhile elections, wherever the LDF and UDF often benefited from tacit cross-voting to support the BJP astatine bay, some fronts this clip recovered themselves nether genuine unit from the NDA. The closing days of the run were marked by contention connected each sides. In Palakkad, BJP workers were allegedly caught distributing cash, with videos circulating widely. The Congress, meanwhile, faced allegations implicit the misuse of funds collected for lodging landslide victims successful Wayanad.

Both stories dispersed fast. Both were loudly denied. What besides stood retired was the spectacle of 2 nationalist INDIA bloc partners spending overmuch of the run attacking each different alternatively than the BJP. Each confederation accused the different of colluding with the BJP and compromising Kerala's secular tradition. The run play was besides unusually short- conscionable 3 weeks. Despite that, Prime Minister Modi, location curate Amit Shah, and

Rahul Gandhi

each visited the authorities aggregate times. Everyone wanted Kerala.

Everyone treated it similar it could really alteration hands.

Hotel lobby, lottery king's lad and Puducherry's magnificent chaos

And past determination is Puducherry — impervious that you don't request millions of voters to make concern quantities of governmental drama.The standout infinitesimal of the Puducherry run happened not astatine a rally oregon successful a manifesto but successful a edifice lobby wherever a Union curate sat, waited for astir 2 hours and was stood up.Chief Minister Rangasamy's AINRC had placed 2 steadfast conditions for staying successful the NDA: absorption to the inclusion of the recently formed Latchiya Jananayaga Katchi of Jose Charles Martin — lad of lottery king Santiago Martin — successful the alliance, and a renewed request for statehood for Puducherry.

The BJP agreed to neither. Union Minister Mansukh Mandaviya arrived astatine a edifice successful the UT for confederation talks. Rangasamy did not be the meeting. Until that Thursday evening, determination was genuine speculation that Rangasamy mightiness exit the NDA wholly to signifier an confederation with Vijay's TVK. The BJP instantly dispatched Mandaviya to Puducherry connected a peculiar formation to transportation him. The confederation yet held. Jose Charles Martin remained 1 of the most-watched figures of the Puducherry contest.

His begetter Santiago Martin built 1 of India's largest lottery businesses. The lad launched a enactment from scratch up of these elections and negotiated his mode into the ruling alliance. In a national territory with 30 constituencies and less than a cardinal voters, wherever idiosyncratic constituencies person betwixt 30,000 and 50,000 electors, the dynamics of money, access, and power run otherwise from larger states. Despite everything, Puducherry recorded 89.87% elector turnout- the highest since 1964, the twelvemonth of the archetypal predetermination aft the territory's merger with India. When governmental stakes consciousness personal, radical amusement up. In Puducherry, they ever do.

What it each adds up to

Across 5 states, India's 2026 predetermination play was little a referendum connected immoderate azygous argumentation than a vivid accumulation of what this ideology looks and feels similar erstwhile it runs astatine afloat throttle.A megastar's mania turned lethal earlier his run officially began — and helium kept campaigning anyway, much cautiously, successful the shadiness of 41 deaths. A main curate posted an AI-generated video of himself shooting astatine a spiritual minority, watched it spell viral, watched it get deleted and past defended it. Ninety lakh voters were struck from a list, those who remained connected it showed up successful grounds numbers, arsenic if to reply the deletion with defiance. And successful Puducherry, a Union curate sat unsocial successful a edifice lobby, stood up by an state successful India's smallest electoral theatre, implicit a quality involving a lottery baron’s son.