How Cong lost the plot in Haryana
CHANDIGARH: Nearly 12 hours of drama over the validity of two ballots culminated in the shock victory of BJP-backed independent candidate Kartikeya Sharma and expected win of saffron party nominee Krishan Lal Panwar on Saturday morning.
Congress candidate, Ajay Maken who looked strong on paper lost narrowly after the Election Commission (EC) on Friday midnight ordered that all 89 ballots polled to elect the two Upper House MPs from Haryana be counted. The EC had on Friday evening put the counting of ballots on hold after the BJP and Kartikeya complained that two Congress MLAs violated the conduct of election rules by showing their ballots to unauthorized perSharma sons. The complaint was rejected by the EC after a sevenhour long deliberation at Nirvachan Sadan in New Delhi.
The upset caused by Kartikeya, however, did not come without help from the Congress. While the BJP candidate Krishan Lal Panwar won comfortably securing 36 first preference votes, Kartikeya romped home despite getting 23 first preference votes as against 29 first preference votes of Congress candidate, Ajay Maken.
Election officials said Panwar needed 30 votes to win and his six-plus votes were transferred to Kartikeya (who was the second preference in all 36) who edged out Maken. Maken did not get any second preference votes, and Kartikeya was declared the winner.
Since all 31 Congress MLAs voted on Friday, Maken should have won the second seat comfortably. However, it was not to be. Congress MLA Kuldeep Bishnoi switched sides to vote for Kartikeya while the ballot of another Congress legislator was declared invalid for being marked improperly.
NEW DELHI: The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) effectively retained its tally of 95 seats in the Rajya Sabha with the help of Independent MP Kartikeya Sharma after the latest round of biennial elections, once again demonstrating the ruling dispensation’s ability to pull extra votes and win key seats.
In the fiercely-fought poll, the BJP won three seats each from Maharashtra and Karnataka. Its candidates won in Rajasthan and Haryana and an independent candidate it backed in Haryana also won. Purely on numbers, it should have won two each in Karnataka and Maharashtra, and the independent candidate backed by it should not have won. Thus, effectively, the party won three more seats than it was expected to.
The BJP’s ascent in the Rajya Sabha had lifted its tally from 68 seats at the beginning of 2018 to 95 before this round of biennial elections. Now, after all the results are out, the ruling party has effectively maintained that tally with the help of an independent in Haryana.
The NDA’s tally, however, went down by one seat as BJP’s ally JD(U) saw a net loss of one seat. The JD(U) fought in two seats but won only one.
The BJP’s biggest gain came from Uttar Pradesh where it won the assembly elections in March. Out of the 11 Rajya Sabha seats that went to polls from India’s most populous state, the BJP won eight — an addition of three seats to its earlier tally of five. This big victory in UP helped the BJP compensate for the loss of three seats in Rajasthan, and one seat each in Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand and Maharashtra.
The Congress’s net gain was one seat in these elections. It won a total of 10 out of the 57 seats that went to the polls. The party gained three seats in Rajasthan and one in Chhattisgarh, while it lost a seat each in Uttarakhand, Punjab and Karnataka. In Haryana, its candidate Ajay Maken failed to win.
The marginal increase could provide some cheer for the Congress that has lost a string of state elections to the BJP and some regional parties, although the losses in Haryana, Karnataka (where it could not strike a deal with the JDS) and Maharashtra (where a Shiv Sena candidate from the MVA alliance lost) will worry it. The other big gainer is the Aam Aadmi Party, cashing in on its victory in the Punjab elections. Arvind Kejriwal’s party won both Rajya Sabha seats of Punjab that went to polls in this round, taking its Rajya Sabha tally to 10.
The DMK and the BJD retained 3 seats each, and the SP and BSP lost two seats each.