NOTA played a big role in BJP’s MP defeat

In more than 20 seats, number of NOTA votes was more than the defeat margin of BJP candidates.

In his annual Vijayadashmi address in October, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) chief Mohan Bhagwat had appealed to people not to exercise the “None of the above” (NOTA) option given on the ballot paper while casting their votes.

As per RSS observers, the statement was based on reports the RSS functionaries who were active on the ground, especially in Madhya Pradesh, had given.

In these reports, the functionaries had suggested that a strong anti-incumbency wave was going on in MP against more than 100 BJP MLAs and since the voters were not sure regarding whether they should vote for Congress or not, a large number of them would lodge their protest against the BJP government by opting for NOTA.

In the end, when the results of the state elections were declared, NOTA received more than 5 lakh votes or roughly 1.4% of the total votes polled in MP. In the 2013 polls, NOTA had got 6.4 lakh votes or 1.91% of the total votes.

“In a large number of seats, as per the initial analysis, NOTA has come at the third position. In almost 90% seats, NOTA has got 4-figure votes while it is more than what the defeat margin was for our candidates in 20 plus seats. It is very interesting and also saddening for us that more than 5 lakh people came out of their home, stood in line, just to vote for NOTA,” said a Bhopal-based BJP spokesperson.

“Last time, it was not a close election and hence did not affect us. But if you consider that in the end, we got around 50,000 more votes than the Congress and that we fell short by just 7 seats, then these 5 lakh votes become a huge number,” he added.

According to BJP leaders, the close fight in which the BJP got more votes than the Congress but could not convert it into more seats, was because of the anger against the local MLAs and not the party or the leadership of outgoing Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan as such.

“This was known to us (that the local MLAs were a source of a huge anger). We were getting reports that people of particular constituencies were happy with Shivraj but were angry with their MLAs. And since the MLA was their point of contact to the party, when the election came, they did not spare him or her,” a Rajya Sabha MP said.

“It is pretty obvious that if we had done a course correction earlier by either strictly asking the MLAs to work properly or by deputing ministers to take care of that seat, we would have easily won again. You must understand that there was no wave against Shivraj,” he added. It is only a matter of when, not if, K.T. Rama Rao (KTR), the 42-year-old only son of Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR), would take over as the next Chief Minister, as the father who returned to power for a second term after riding on a massive mandate in the 7 December Assembly elections made the former the party working president.

KCR has announced that he, henceforth, would be devoting his time and energies to national politics and spend time shuttling between Delhi and Hyderabad.

A day after he was sworn in as the Chief Minister of Telangana for a second term, TRS president KCR appointed KTR as the party working president, thus officially making him the number two in the party and future leader in the government too. KCR is yet to form his Cabinet which is expected to be in place next week.

KCR returned to power by winning 88 of the 119 Assembly seats in the 7 December elections. The Congressled Mahakutami, which wanted to unseat TRS, had got 19 and its ally, TDP got two seats.

KCR has taken the decision to devote more time for national politics where he wants to build a Federal Front with non-Congress and non-BJP parties. He wants to spend more time in Delhi before and after the next Lok Sabha elections. KCR has announced that he wants to meet experts from different fields so that a viable economic model can be prepared as basis for the Front.

The sudden announcement of KTR as the working president of TRS has caught party leaders and cadre unawares and they swung into celebrations across the state. Scores of party leaders and newly elected MLAs