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March 5, 1998

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ELECTIONS '96

The way Maharashtrians have swung...

Anant Gaundalkar

The tumultuous political situation in the country has forced as many as three Lok Sabha and two assembly elections in Maharashtra in the nineties. And the results of these polls reveal a changing scenario in the state.

To start with, during the 1990 assembly poll, the Congress snatched as many as 141 seats of the total 288, and Sharad Pawar continued his stint as chief minister. The Congress domination was again highlighted during the 1991 general election when it clinched 38 seats. Pawar was then inducted in the central government as the defence minister, as a result of which Sudhakar Naik became chief minister. It was during Naik's tenure that Bombay witnessed the worst-ever communal riots in Indian history. Pawar returned to take up the CMship again.

Then came the historic assembly election of 1995. The Bharatiya Janata Party-Shiv Sena combine captured 137 seats. Thus, the first-ever non-Congress government, in the true sense of the word, was sworn in with the Shiv Sena's Manohar Joshi as chief minister and the BJP's Gopinath Munde as his deputy.

In the Lok Sabha poll which followed a year later, the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance got 33 seats.

But now, after three years of power in the state, the alliance has suffered its first major crisis as the Congress swept the polls with overwhelming majority.

The following are the results of the two recent assembly and three Lok Sabha elections in Maharashtra:
Party1990 assembly elections 1991 Lok Sabha election1995 assembly election 1996 Lok Sabha election1998 Lok Sabha election
Congress14138 801533
BJP425 64184
Janata Dal24_ 11__
Shiv Sena524 73156
PWP8_ 6_1
ICSS1_ ___
CPI2_ 3__
CPM2
Muslim League1_ ___
RPI1_ __4
SJP__ 3__
MVC__ 1__
NVAS__ 1 __
Independents 13_ 46__
Total seats28848 2884848

Key: BJP: Bharatiya Janata Party, PWP: Peasants and Workers Party, ICSS: Indian Congress Socialist, CPI: Communist Party of India, CPM: Communist Party of India-Marxist, RPI: Republican Party of India, SJP: Samajwadi Janata Party, MVC: Maharashtra Vikas Congress, NVAS: Nag Vidharbha Andolan Samiti.

Elections '98

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