Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh Assembly Elections 2013: what could happen?

It is expected that the BJP will be making a comeback to power in Rajasthan as well as Madhya Pradesh. As per an exit poll conducted by Times Now and CVoter the party is expected to bag 130 seats as opposed to 48 seats for the Congress in Rajasthan. It is expected that in Madhya Pradesh, BJP will win a maximum of 145 seats as compared to Congress that is supposed to bag no more than 77 seats.

 

Congress has, however, stated that it will be overthrowing BJP that has been in power in Madhya Pradesh for a decade. In one survey BJP has been predicted to win 161 seats in Madhya Pradesh and 147 in Rajasthan while Congress is not expected to gain any more than 62 in MP and 39 in Rajasthan.

 

There are 2586 candidates in MP that will be contesting for the various spots but the competition is primarily limited between Congress and BJP. Shivraj Singh Chouhan will be contesting the elections from Vidisha and Budhni, which has traditionally been a stronghold for him. As far as Rajasthan is concerned the total number of voters has been estimated at 25 million people. In Rajasthan the elections are being keenly contested by BJP and Congress both of whom have assured victory.

 

The voting in Rajasthan happened on December 1 and featured 199 constituencies where 2087 candidates are fighting it out. Among them 166 are women and there is one transgender individual as well.

 

The voting started from 0800 hours at the morning across 47,223 polling booths in the state and among them 10,793 have been regarded as critical. Polling in Churu constituency will happen on December 13 after Jagdish Meghwal, the candidate representing Bahujan Samaj Party, breathed his last. During 2008, 66.25% voters had polled in Rajasthan and Congress had won back then. Before going to the 2013 elections Congress had 102 seats compared to BJP’s 79. In the present elections too they are the main entities but there are other parties such as the National Peoples Party or NPP.

 

The NPP is led by Kirori Lal Meena, who heads the Meena community in Rajasthan as well. This party has 150 candidates. Bahujan Samaj Party or BSP, which is led by Mayawati, has 195 contestants from various constituencies. For both these parties the immediate aim would be to deflate the vote banks of the major parties – BJP and Congress. In addition, CPI has 23 candidates along with 38 representing the CPI (M). There will be 758 candidates who will be fighting independently as well.

 

In 2008, BSP were successful in 6 constituencies but all of them opted to get inducted into Congress. Incidentally both the states have recorded an unprecedented turnout of voters this time around. There are 4.08 crore voters in Rajasthan this time around and 1.92 crore among them are women. There are 17 lakh people as well who will be voting for the first time. The administration also took care of the issue of security with at least 1.19 lakh police officers that included 38,175 CRPF soldiers.

 

Ashok Gehlot, the incumbent Chief Minister, will be contesting from Sardarpura, which is home constituency in Jodhpur and he will be fighting it out against Shambhu Singh Khetasar, a Rajput candidate who will represent the BJP. Vasundhara Raje, who is likely to become the CM if BJP wins in Rajasthan, will be contesting from Jhalarapatan, Hadauti and will be going up against Meenakshi Chandrawat, who has been an MLA before and will represent the Congress.

 

This year MP has seen a record voting of at least 70% which is higher than 2008 when 69.58% people turned up to vote. It has been estimated that almost 46 million people voted this time around. Everywhere on November 25 the voting started at 0800 hours and ended at 1700 hours. Baihar, Lanjhi and Paraswada, which are affected by Naxalism, were the only constituencies where the voting ended at 1500 hours. Overall, the elections were conducted in a peaceful manner. However, there were reports of minor violence in Morena and Bhind and few other constituencies and mishaps. At Vijayraghavgarh, Katni an assistant poll officer named KB Shrivastava passed away on duty owing to a cardiac arrest. Ranjana Baghel, a state level minister, had allegations of bribing voters against her and so a case was registered in this instance as well.

 

The state has also seen some of the prominent figures of national politics come and campaign for their respective parties – the list includes both Narendra Modi and Rahul Gandhi. Shivraj Singh Chauhan, in fact, used the 3D Virtual Live Technology so that he could address various rallies from one location. He is the second CM after Narendra Modi to utilize this technology.

 

A major part of the campaign undertaken by BJP for this campaign was on social media, especially with sites such as Facebook and Twitter and the precise aim in this case was to draw the youth. The BJP mobile app was also released on platforms such as Android, Symbion and iOS for the same reason.

 

From the looks of it, it seems likely that BJP will be ruling the roost in these two states come December 8, 2013. That would be a major step forward for Narendra Modi as a candidate for the post of Prime Minister as one can expect him to use these successes for strengthening his push. In case, it happens the other way round, it will be Congress that will receive a much needed fillip before the all important elections of 2014.
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Related Information:

Rajasthan Election Results 2013

Madhya Pradesh Election Results 2013