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Madhya Pradesh by-elections : BJP wins, but worried |
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The BJP has won the byelections to the Vidisha Lok Sabha constituency and the Malehra Assembly seat in Madhya Pradesh. The Vidisha seat was vacated by Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan while Bharatiya Janshakti President Uma Bharti quit the Malehra seat.
State Minister Ram Pal Singh won the Vidisha seat by defeating Rajshri Singh of Congress by over 73,000 votes. He polled 2,58,263 votes against the Congress nominee’s 1,73,175. Raghunandan Sharma of the Bharatiya Janshakti Party came third with 1,37,354 votes.
In Malehra, Kapurchand Ghuwara (BJP) wrested the seat by a margin of 4,490 votes. He polled 38,779 vote against Bharatiya Janshakti Party candidate Rekha Yadav’s 34,289. Jagdish Shukla (Congress) was third with 20,183.
In Orissa, the Congress retained the Talsara Assembly seat, giving a jolt to the ruling Biju Janata Dal-BJP alliance.
Initially, the BJP expressed happiness at Uma Bharti’s failure to win either of the two prestigious elections in Madhya Pradesh. But careful scrutiny of the results has brought home to the party that Uma Bharti’s party has been able to get a significant number of people to vote for it. BJP leaders are now admitting privately that it is too early to write Uma Bharti’s political obituary. They concede that the threat from her party will have to be destroyed, or she would have to be won over before the Assembly elections due in Madhya Pradesh in the winter of 2008.
Uma Bharti’s Bharatiya Janshakti party lost by just over 4,400 votes in the Malehra assembly seat, reducing the Congress to a distant third. In the Vidisha Lok Sabha seat also, her party could get over 1,30,000 votes.
Far from being disheartened at the election results, Uma Bharti’s resolve to fight back against the BJP leadership has only increased now. She is campaigning extensively in Bhagalpur, Bihar, for an independent candidate to spoil the chances of BJP’s Shahnawaj Hussein.
BJP sources say that even if BJS failed to emerge as an alternative to the BJP in Madhya Pradesh, it can manage to get
enough votes to ensure a Congress victory in the 2008 polls.
Trinamul may part company with NDA
The BJP may get another setback, this time in West Bengal if Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamul Congress decides to part company with the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance. The Trinamul Congress general council is meeting in Kolkata today, Nov. 6, where a decision on the issue is expected to be taken. A key Trinamul leader said in Kolkata on Nov. 1, “Mamata has already made up her mind. Monday’s meeting is significant.”
Mamata hinted as much, saying: “I have decided to announce an important policy decision concerning my future strategy in front of party workers.”
Asked if the “policy decision” was on her relations with the NDA, she averted a direct answer. “Be patient. You’ll know everything on Monday.”
Congress general secretary in charge of West Bengal Margaret Alva said in Delhi that she would be the “happiest person” if Mamata quits the NDA. “Mamata is a good friend of mine and I am in regular touch with her,” she added.
The Congress, which had supported last month’s Trinamul-sponsored bandh in protest against land acquisition in Singur, had been sending feelers to her with the request to snap ties with the NDA since the September 16 bypolls.
Mamata had backed the Congress nominee for the Malda Lok Sabha seat, though the BJP, her official partner, was in the fray. The Congress reciprocated by not fielding a candidate for the Bongaon Assembly seat. Trinamul withdrew its candidate in Purulia and the Congress in Katwa - both Lok Sabha seats.
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