Trends favour BJP, but Cong giving tough fight in MP

Vibha Sharma
Tribune News Service
Gwalior, May 9

As the General Election enters its penultimate round, speculations based on theories and past trends have started doing the rounds for the 29 Lok Sabha seats in Madhya Pradesh.

While the overall trends seem to be favouring the BJP, the Congress — in some key constituencies — is giving a good fight and also appears to be having an upper hand, particularly in Gwalior-Chambal, Vindh and Malwa-Nimar regions.

Senior saffron leaders agree that the BJP may lose seats in Gwalior-Chambal while Congress leaders admit that infighting and wrong choices could have spoilt their chances on winnable seats.

A senior Gwalior-based leader explains that ever since Chhattisgarh was carved out of it, the Congress never got a majority in Madhya Pradesh. It was after many years that the Congress managed to get the better of the BJP and form its government in 2018.

“Prior to the division of Madhya Pradesh, a large part of Congress’ support used to come from the regions now in Chhattisgarh,” he adds.

Whether the Congress will be able to replicate the success of the 2018 Assembly poll in the Lok Sabha elections in the bastion of the BJP and its ideological fountainhead RSS remains to be seen, but trends indicate that it is in a better place than it ever was in recent years. 

Unless of course, some spectacular political move changes it all because now, it is time for BJP bastions in Madhyashetra (Bhopal and Vidisha), Gwalior-Chambal and Malwa-Nimar to vote.

Nevertheless, one thing is clear. Had the Lok Sabha elections happened before the Assembly poll, the Congress would have done much better than what it would do now. Now, the Congress is battling very alert BJP/RSS cadres for whom not letting the 2014 tally of 27 (26 after a bypoll defeat) go below 21/22 is a matter of prestige.

And two, had the Congress distributed tickets carefully, the situation could have been better for it. Take for example Congress’ candidate in Gwalior Ashok Singh. According to the Congress leader, “if Ashok Singh wins, the grand old party may end up with 15/16 of the 29 seats. Otherwise, it would have to be satisfied with a single digit (8/9) or at the most 10.” This is the variation in Congress’ 

performance that ticket distribution is expected to bring 

into the equation.

Gwalior constituency is the best example of how different camps in the state Congress — represented by Digvijaya Singh, Kamal Nath and Jyotiraditya Scindia — are working at variance with one another.

Ashok Singh belongs to the Digvijaya camp. So, the majority of Congress workers from the region are engaged in Scindia’s campaign in Guna, leaving Ashok Singh to fend for himself more or less.

“While he is giving a good fight to BJP’s Vivek Shejwalkar, Ashok Singh’s barometer will rise or fall in relation to the support he gets from Scindia whose stronghold the Gwalior-Chambal region is,” the Gwalior-based Congress leader says.

What also appears to be going against Ashok Singh is the caste factor. He belongs to the Kamariya (Yadav) community which has a running feud with the Thakur/Rajput community in the region. “In this Kamariya versus Rajput fight for control, it is quite possible that the BJP simple, Maharashtrian Brahmin candidate manages to get though even though Ashok Singh is the stronger candidate. But if Ashok Singh wins, it will mean that the ‘mahaul’ (conditions) was in favour of the Congress,” explains the Congress leader. 

TRENDS (29 constituencies of Madhya Pradesh)

• Gwalior-Chambal: Gwalior, Morena, Guna and Bhind; Congress-2, BJP-1, close fight- 1
• Bundelkhand: Tikamgarh, Sagar, Damoh and Khajuraho; BJP-3, close fight-1 
• Vindh: Satna, Rewa and Sidhi and Shadol; Congress-2, BJP-1, close fight-1
• Mahakoshal: Jabalpur, Mandla, Balaghat and Chindwara; BJP-2, Congress-1, close fight-1
• Madhyashetra: Hoshangabad, Vidisha, Bhopal, Rajgarh and Betul; BJP-3, Congress-1, close fight-1
• Malwa-Nimar: Dhar, Indore, Dewas, Ujjain, Ratlam-Jhabua, Mandsaur, Khandwa and Khargone; BJP-5, Congress-3