Stage set for penultimate phase of Lok Sabha polls 2024

Tribune Web Desk

Vibha Sharma

Chandigarh, May 23

Saturday will mark the penultimate Phase-6 of the ongoing seven-phase Lok Sabha elections. As many as 889 candidates will test their luck in 58 constituencies across eight states and union territories.

The impending Phase-6 may also play an interesting role in deciding Congress’ overall fortunes in the General Election. In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the Grand Old Party had almost drawn a naught in the 58 seats going to the polls on May 25. However, if ground reports are any indications, the Congress may be in line for some breakthroughs/revival of fortunes in “a couple of constituencies, especially in Haryana”.

All 10 seats of Haryana and seven in adjoining Delhi will poll on Saturday. In 2019, the BJP had swept through these 17 seats in the northern plains, wiping the Opposition. In fact, the Congress also lost the Rohtak bastion of former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda.

Also, in 2019, the majority of these seats were won by BJP/NDA allies and the regional players, like Biju Janata Dal in Odisha and Trinamool Congress in West Bengal. 

Other Phase-6 constituencies include Bihar (8), Jammu and Kashmir (1), Jharkhand (4), Odisha (6), Uttar Pradesh (14) and West Bengal (8). The 14 Uttar Pradesh seats include key constituencies Sultanpur, Allahabad, Shrawasti, Domariyaganj Azamgarh and Bhadohi. In 2019, the BJP had won a majority of them. 

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has claimed that the opposition INDIA bloc would not win a single seat in UP. Likewise, for Bihar, his prediction is that the BJP-led NDA will “sweep through all the 40 Lok Sabha seats”. In 2019, the BJP-led NDA comprising the JD(U) and the Lok Janshakti Party had won 39 of the 40 seats in Bihar. Led by the RJD, the Mahagathbandhan, including the Congress and the RLSP, managed to win just one seat in the state.  

Likewise, in Jharkhand, BJP and its ally won 12 of the 14 seats there.

However, in 2024, the INDIA block members are sensing a “turnaround”. 

Mocking BJP’s ‘400 paar’ slogan, they claim “the ruling party would not even cross the 200 mark”. 

Rhetoric apart, observers point to Congress’s “lack of strongholds” in Phase-6 as compared to other stakeholders like the BJP, the BJD and the TMC.

“There are seats in Jharkhand where the BJP has consistently won like Dhanbad and Jamshedpur. Likewise, BJD dominates Odisha, particularly Cuttack, Dhenkanal, Keonjhar, and Puri,” they say. 

In Odisha—Bhubaneswar, Puri, Dhenkanal, Keonjhar (SC), Cuttack, Sambalpur—will go to the polls on Saturday.

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