The decline of the Congress had come in two phases. The first phase, which began in Kerala in 1957 and peaked in Andhra Pradesh in 1983, saw Congress hegemony challenged by parties based on the identities of region, language and class. The second phase, which began in north India in 1967 and peaked in the same region in the 1990s, saw the Congress losing ground to parties basing themselves on the identities of caste and religion.
