Numbers Speak | Simultaneous elections in Odisha and Andhra show how regional powers can outperform national parties at the ‘voting booth’

One of the factors working against the idea of ​​simultaneous elections in India is that regional parties may be excluded if Sabah and Assembly polls are held together. However, past election data from Odisha and Andhra Pradesh analyzed by News18 tells a different story. Regional parties in both states gave a tough fight to the national party that formed the central government.

The idea of ​​simultaneous polls has been proposed many times, but no common ground has been reached so far to implement it. The state of Odisha (formerly Orissa) has held simultaneous assembly and assembly elections at least four times. This year will be the fifth time the event has been held.

Since 2004, Biju Janata Dal (BJD), a regional party in Odisha, has been winning the highest number of seats in the assembly polls as well as in the state assembly polls, leaving much room for the Congress and the BJP. Not left.

In the 2004 elections, the BJD won 11 of the state’s 21 seats, while the BJP came in second with seven seats. In 2009, the BJD won 14 seats while the Congress came in second with just six seats. In 2014, the BJD won an overwhelming victory in the polls, winning 20 seats, leaving the BJP with just one seat. In 2019, Naveen Patnaik’s party won 12 seats and the BJP came second with eight seats.

Patnaik founded the party in 1997 and has been its leader ever since. When assembly polls were held in the state between 2004 and 2019, the BJD won between 61 and 117 seats. Even if it did not cross the halfway mark, it emerged as the single largest party.

In 2004, the BJP was an ally of the BJD, but the two parted ways shortly before the 2009 polls. This time, the three main political parties in the state are the BJD, the BJP and the Congress, and both the Assembly and Congress polls will be held in four phases from May 13.

Although the situation is different from Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, which has multiple regional parties, also does not give much space to national parties and gives preference to local leaders when voting in simultaneous Sabah and Assembly elections. did. The Congress managed to retain support in the state, but only till the 2009 polls.

In the 2019 assembly polls, things were so bad for the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party that it ended up with zero seats and all candidates lost their security deposits. 173 BJP candidates and 174 Congress leaders participated in the fray. Both parties received only about 2% of the total vote. In the 2019 assembly polls in Andhra, the national parties received a total of 2.73 per cent votes. When it came to the Reichstag, things were far from good for both national parties. They had zero seats.

The 2019 elections were the first elections since Telangana was separated from Andhra Pradesh. Although the Union Cabinet agreed to the bifurcation in 2013, it was only on June 2, 2014 that the then Indian President Pranab Mukherjee officially gazetted the separation of Telangana from Andhra Pradesh. Ta. The 2014 elections were held in the state in April and May. Lok Sabha elections were also held considering both the states as one unit.

Currently, Andhra Pradesh has 25 Assembly seats and 175 Assembly seats. However, till the 2014 polls, the state had 42 Assembly seats and 294 Assembly seats.

The Bharatiya Janata Party’s situation in the state is very poor, having won a total of only 13 and 3 seats in the state between 2004 and 2019 elections. The Congress, which formed governments at the Center in 2004 and 2009, emerged as the single largest party in Sabah and the parliament within the states at the time. But since 2014, the state has changed its voting patterns.

In the 2014 and 2019 elections, the BJP and Congress won a combined 5 and 30 seats.

The Yuvajana Sramika Ryuthu Congress Party (YSRCP), formed in 2011, has changed the political landscape of the state. In 2019, it won 22 of the 25 seats in the state legislature and 151 of the 175 seats in the national assembly. It also dealt a blow to national political parties in 2014.

N. Chandrababu Naidu’s Telugu Desam Party (TDP) came second in 2019 with 3 seats and 23 seats. Pawan Kalyan’s Jana Sena made his debut in 2019 when one of its members entered Parliament.