Regional satraps pose bigger threat to bigger political players in Madhya Pradesh

Bhopal – There has been a triangular contest at some places in the Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections. This happened due to the entry of regional parties. Many parties including SP, BSP, AAP and AIMIM are contesting elections in MP. Due to the presence of these regional parties in the 2018 assembly elections, there was a close contest between BJP and Congress on 30 seats.

The candidates’ victory or defeat on these seats was by just 3000 votes or less. Out of 30, 15 seats were won by Congress and 14 seats were won by BJP. Whereas, BSP had won one seat.

At the same time, BJP had won in the 2013 assembly elections. That year also there were 33 such seats where BJP and Congress candidates won by less than 3000 votes. Out of 33, 18 were won by BJP, 12 by Congress, two by BSP and one by an independent candidate. This clearly shows that small parties are a big challenge in MP elections.

The most important among these is Bahujan Samaj Party. Bahujan Samaj Party has formed an alliance with Gondwana Gantantra Party in MP elections. Also, Samajwadi Party is separating from Indi alliance and contesting elections separately. So far, candidates have been announced for 31 seats in MP. BJP is trying to gain edge by fielding its big leaders.

In 2013, there was very close competition on 33 seats in the state. In the 2018 assembly elections, 26 of these seats were won by different parties. This clearly shows how small parties influence the results in MP. The results changed on these 26 seats compared to 2013. In 2018, Congress won 16 seats and BJP won 9 seats. Also an independent candidate had won. Along with this, there were seven seats where BJP had won in 2013 and 2018. Of these, Congress won four seats and BJP won three seats.

These are those seats

Timarni Assembly: This is a reserved seat for ST. Here BJP defeated the Congress candidate by 2213 votes. Here Gondwana Gantantra Party had caused loss to Congress. Its candidate got 5722 votes.

Devtalab Assembly Seat: On this assembly seat, BJP defeated BSP by 1080 votes. Here BSP’s game has been spoiled because of SP. SP candidate got 2213 votes.

Rajpur Assembly Seat: This seat is reserved for ST. Congress had won the 2018 assembly elections here by 932 votes. BJP’s game was spoiled because of CPI. CPI got 2411 votes and AAP got 1510 votes.

Vijaypur Assembly seat: BJP defeated the Congress candidate by 2840 votes. Here BSP got 35,628 votes.

Gwalior Rural Assembly seat: BJP defeated BSP candidate by 1517 votes. Whereas, Bahujan Sangharsh Dal had got 7698 votes. Aam Aadmi Party had got 2689 votes.

Gwalior South Assembly Seat: On this seat, Congress defeated the BJP candidate by 121 votes. Here the rebel BJP candidate got 30745 votes. Along with this, BSP got 3098 votes, AAP got 646 votes and NOTA got 1550 votes.

Bina Assembly seat: BJP defeated the Congress candidate here by 460 votes. Whereas, the candidate of The Republican Party of India got 1563 votes.

Maihar Assembly Seat: BJP defeated Congress candidate by 2984 votes. Gondwana Republic Party had caused big loss to Congress here. GGP got 33,397 votes and SP got 11,202 votes.

This was the situation in 2018

It is noteworthy that in the 2018 assembly elections, BJP got 109 seats, whereas in 2013 it was 165. At the same time, Congress seats had doubled. Congress had 114 seats in 2018 while it had 28 seats in 2013. At the same time, Congress was left just two seats short of majority. In MP with 230 seats, 116 seats are required to form the assembly government. In such a situation, the Congress government was formed with the support of four independents, one SP and two BSP MLAs.

At the same time, after 15 months in March 2020, the Congress government fell after the rebellion of Jyotiraditya Scindia. After this, by-elections were held on 26 seats, in which BJP won 18 seats and Congress won seven seats. An independent had won on one.

In view of these results, BJP and Congress are working with different strategies on the closely contested seats. The BJP leader said that our party is focusing on the booth level. Especially in those places where we lost the elections by a very narrow margin in 2018. But there was a bumper victory in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. We had marked 12000 such booths. At the same time, Congress said that we are working on a strategy to strengthen the booth at the grassroots level. Also taking full care of local equations.