LUCKNOW, Jan. 12 -- With the 2027 Uttar Pradesh assembly elections still more than a year away, the opposition political landscape is already showing signs of churn after a statement by Avinash Pandey, the Congress in-charge for Uttar Pradesh, in which he openly welcomed the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) into the INDIA bloc.

The remark has reignited speculation over possible opposition realignments in India's most electorally significant state and underlined a familiar political reality: defeating the BJP in Uttar Pradesh without the BSP remains an uphill task.

Although the Congress has not indicated any formal talks, Pandey's public outreach is being seen as a strategic signal rather than an offhand comment. It has altered the tone of pre-...