Kohima: Nagaland leads the nation in political instability. The state accounts for 32 cases of MPs and MLAs jumping ship after their election. A new report from the Association for Democratic Reforms and National Election Watch confirms these findings as of July 12, 2026. The data tracks 111 total defections across India between 2022 and 2026.
Elected officials are restless. The total count includes 26 Lok Sabha members, seven Rajya Sabha senators, and 78 state legislators. These switches occurred across 17 states and Union Territories. West Bengal follows Nagaland with 20 recorded cases. Legislators shift sides through individual defections, formal party mergers, or by resigning and winning bye-elections. Some regain their seats after disqualification.
Nagaland’s numbers spiked due to the merger between the Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party and the Naga People’s Front. The Nationalist Democratic Progressive Party led the exodus with 25 defectors. The All India Trinamool Congress lost 20 members, while the Indian National Congress lost 19. Bharat Rashtra Samithi, Aam Aadmi Party, and Nationalist Congress Party also saw departures.
The Naga People’s Front gained the most ground, absorbing 32 members. The Bharatiya Janata Party picked up 29, and the Nationalist Congress Party-Sharadchandra Pawar added 20. The watchdog group warns their list may be incomplete due to poor record-keeping. The ADR stated, "the recent fall of governments in some State Assemblies was attributed to defections by their MLAs."
Updated at 26th September 2026 at 1:48am
The report digs into specific movements beyond Nagaland. West Bengal’s 20 cases involve Lok Sabha members switching from the All India Trinamool Congress to the Nationalist Citizens Party of India, a move currently stalled before the Lok Sabha Speaker. In Telangana, nine Bharat Rashtra Samithi MLAs jumped to the Congress. Goa and Punjab reported eight switches each, with Punjab’s count split between Rajya Sabha members and state legislators.
Other shifts include six Shiv Sena members in Maharashtra moving from the Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray faction to the Eknath Shinde camp. Smaller counts cropped up in Meghalaya, Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Sikkim, Uttar Pradesh, and Delhi.
The watchdog pushed for an overhaul of the anti-defection laws to curb these moves. They want to strip presiding officers of the power to decide on disqualifications, shifting that duty to the President or state governors based on Election Commission advice. They also called for mandatory deadlines on disqualification petitions and suggested blocking defectors from holding public office until they win a fresh mandate from voters.
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