The elephant moves slowly but firmly. Its motionless figure is often undistinguishable from the brown background of forests, especially in the summers, till one reaches well within its striking distance. Bahujan Samaj Party seems to have acquired some such qualities of its election symbol. The party doubled its vote share in all the four state Assembly elections in the Hindi heartland – Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Delhi – touted as the semifinal before the General Elections due within next six months.
So will it repeat the feat in the finals as well – in the general elections that are
due in six months time? It pretty well might. For consider: it took the BSP – founded in 1984 – four Assembly polls (with a single-digit tally each time), three Parliamentary elections and a pre-poll tie up with the Samajwadi Party in 1993 to make its presence felt in Uttar Pradesh. The party had brief stints at power there with the Bharatiya Janata Party’s support in 1995, 1997 and 2002, before it secured a complete majority in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly election last year. Those who smirk at the BSP’s tally this time – two seats each in Delhi and Chhattisgarh, six in Rajasthan and seven in Madhya Pradesh – need to wake up to some facts that are not so clearly written on the political wall. Its vote share in Delhi rose to 12; in Madhya Pradesh to 11; in Rajasthan to eight; and in Chhattisgarh to six.
Significantly, all these states have traditionally been two-party states, with almost no space for a third party. The Bahujan Samaj Party still bagged well over 10,000 votes in nearly half of the constituencies it contested in Delhi, and a quarter of those it did in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. “In Delhi, it demolished the notion that the BSP would damage only the Congress,” conceded a senior BJP leader, who naturally did not wish to be named. And he added that but for the BSP, the Congress would almost certainly have registered an even more emphatic win in Rajasthan than it eventually did.....Continue
So will it repeat the feat in the finals as well – in the general elections that are
due in six months time? It pretty well might. For consider: it took the BSP – founded in 1984 – four Assembly polls (with a single-digit tally each time), three Parliamentary elections and a pre-poll tie up with the Samajwadi Party in 1993 to make its presence felt in Uttar Pradesh. The party had brief stints at power there with the Bharatiya Janata Party’s support in 1995, 1997 and 2002, before it secured a complete majority in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly election last year. Those who smirk at the BSP’s tally this time – two seats each in Delhi and Chhattisgarh, six in Rajasthan and seven in Madhya Pradesh – need to wake up to some facts that are not so clearly written on the political wall. Its vote share in Delhi rose to 12; in Madhya Pradesh to 11; in Rajasthan to eight; and in Chhattisgarh to six.Significantly, all these states have traditionally been two-party states, with almost no space for a third party. The Bahujan Samaj Party still bagged well over 10,000 votes in nearly half of the constituencies it contested in Delhi, and a quarter of those it did in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. “In Delhi, it demolished the notion that the BSP would damage only the Congress,” conceded a senior BJP leader, who naturally did not wish to be named. And he added that but for the BSP, the Congress would almost certainly have registered an even more emphatic win in Rajasthan than it eventually did.....Continue
