IN retaining Mohammed Hamid Ansari as vice-president, the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) and its Manmohan Singh-led government, though beleaguered on all fronts, have got their political arithmetic right.

There is a sense of fair play. Ansari could have been the presidential candidate but for Pranab Mukherjee's choice.

The opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had said Ansari lacked "stature". He was dismissed by the powerful socialist ally Mulayam Singh Yadav as a babu (bureaucrat) not suited for high political office. Yet, he gets a second term.

In doing so, the UPA has broken a 55-year-old tradition. Vice-president Sarvapelli Radhakrishnan was retained way back in 1957, when then president Rajendra Prasad also got a second term.

A career diplomat, Ansari was India's permanent representative to the United Nations, high commissioner to Australia and ambassador to the United Arab Emirates, Afghanistan, Iran and Saudi Arabia.

With two doctorates, he was the vice-chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University and headed the National Minorities Commission.

Ansari is a West Asia scholar. He has written trenchantly on the Palestinian issue. He questioned India's official line on Iraq and the vote against Iran in the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

His otherwise uneventful tenure as chairman of the Rajya Sabha was marred by a midnight adjournment of the upper house, abruptly closing a stormy debate on Lokpal, the ombudsman that is the bone of contention between the government, the opposition and sections of civil society.

He earned the odium of millions watching the debate on television.

So, it will be Mukherjee the president and Ansari the vice-president, both original UPA choices. A token contest is likely next month. The UPA scores again over the opposition National Democratic Alliance (NDA).

But the woes of both alliances have been accentuated. Although designated national parties, Congress and the BJP are fast losing their support base to strong regional outfits.

The transformation of a 714 million (2009) electorate into a modern society has brought about a significant change. The traditional rulers -- the sophisticated, educated and urban-oriented upper castes -- are fast losing space to a new class emerging from the intermediary and the historically deprived backward castes.

Estimated to account for more than half the Indian population, they have emerged in the power corridors in seven states and in Parliament. Come the 2014 polls, more states are likely to pass into the hands of this new class of politicians.

Their current leaders are socialist Mulayam Singh and his technocrat son Akhilesh, chief minister of the most populous Uttar Pradesh. In April, he replaced Mayawati, another formidable leader of the deprived classes.

Under Nitish Kumar, Bihar has done very well. The creation of new states, Jharkhand and Chhatisgarh with significant tribal populations, necessitates that leaders from these tribes sooner than later take charge of the huge forest and mineral wealth. The alternative is violence and Maoism.

This transformation is directly at the expense of the two main parties. If Congress is fast losing ground, the satraps-challenged BJP is not marching to acquire it.

The Congress' 2004 electoral success was mainly after it shed its prima donna manners in 2002 at its conclave in Shimla and looked for allies. The BJP had done so earlier, with great success. Both play second fiddle to regional caste-driven parties.

The national parties' space has been shrinking. It is an uneasy co-existence.

The problems Atal Bihari Vajpayee faced heading a coalition government have increased for Manmohan Singh as state satraps call the shots and block federal decisions.

The Congress currently rules in eight states, six with its own majority and two as leading coalition partner. The BJP rules in six states on its own and is junior partner in three states.

Between them, the two parties have 344 seats in the 15th Lok Sabha. However, political commentator Vijay Sanghvi, analysing recent surveys, predicts that they may end up with fewer than 200 seats between them. In other words, 300-plus seats could come under the command of regional bosses.

Unprepared for this change, the powerful middle class is restive. This explains its support for the anti-graft movement and daily denigration of the political class, perceived as corrupt and ineffective in governance.

India Inc, too, is uneasy. Afraid that this change could block economic reform, already slowed down, it wants younger leaders, like Barack Obama and David Cameron.

The next five years will determine whether India will be a true federal state or turn into a confederation of states.