Rediff On The NeT Elections '98: It's Congress vs BJP again in Rajasthan


	HOME \| NEWS \| ELECTIONS '98 \| POLLING BOOTH

February 11, 1998

NEWS
VIEWS
INTERVIEWS
CAMPAIGN TRAIL
ISSUES '98
MANIFESTOS
OVERHEARD
INDIA SPEAKS!
YEH HAI INDIA
CHAT

It's Congress vs BJP again in Rajasthan

Anant Gaundalkar

The battle in Rajasthan, as usual, is between the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party. The outcome of the last six Lok Sabha polls underlines this.

The Janata Party -- which incorporated the BJP's earlier incarnation, the Jan Sangh -- mustered as many as 24 seats in the 25 constituency state in 1977. However, the severe in-fighting in different non-Congress parties which ruled the Centre had its effects in the subsequent two polls, and the BJP failed to clinch a single seat.

The Congress, on the other hand, claimed 18 seats in 1980 and 25 in 1984. A BJP-Janata Dal combine prevented it from gaining even one seat during the 1989 poll. However, parity prevailed in the last two elections, held within five years -- in 1991 and 1996 -- when the two parties shared the honour with almost identical number of seats under their belt.

Following are the Lok Sabha poll details in Rajasthan:

LOK SABHA ELECTIONS

Party	1952	1957	1962	1967	1971	1977	1980	1984	1989	1991	1996
Cong	9	19	14	10	14	1	18	25	_	13	12
BJP	1	_	1	3	4	24	_	_	13	12	12
DDP	3	_	1	_	_	_	_	_	_	_	_
SWA	1	_	3	8	3	_	_	_	_	_	_
SJP	_	_	_	_	_	_	4	_	_	_	_
LKD	_	_	_	_	_	_	2	_	_	_	_
Cong -U	_	_	_	_	_	_	1	_	_	_	_
JD	_	_	_	_	_	_	_	_	11	_	_
CPI-M	_	_	_	_	_	_	_	_	1	_	_
Indp	6	3	3	2	2	_	_	_	_	_	1
Total Seats	20	22	22	23	23	25	25	25	25	25	25

Note: Cong = Congress; BJP = Bharatiya Janata Party; DDP = Doordarshi Party; SWA = Swatantra Party; SJP = Samajwadi Party; LKD = Lok Dal; Cong-U = Congress-Urs; JD = Janata Dal; CPM = Communist Party of India; Indp = Independent.

Tell us what you think of this report