Uttar Pradesh: local bodies, panchayat elections
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2016: Panchayat elections
The Times of India Jan 08 2016
Subhash Mishra
Lucknow
The ruling Samajwadi Party swept the UP district panchayat chairmen's poll with a tally of 60 seats out of possible 74 after Thursday's voting. The party , which had won 36 out of 38 seats, which had been decided without contest, won 24 more after the voting, striking a blow to BJP, which lost in PM Narendra Modi's constituency Varanasi and state chief Laxmi Kant Bajpeyi's constituency Meerut.
While the only solace for BJP was its victory in five seats in western UP out of its total tally of seven, SP's clean sweep had some blemishes as well as the party-supported candidates lost some seats like Bijnor and Sitapur to rebels.
In Bijnor, suspended SP MLA Ruchi Veera, ensured the victory of her husband against the official candidate.She had been suspended after she refused to withdraw her husband's candidature and for supporting him against the officially nominated candidate.Senior minister Shivpal Yadav, however, shrugged off these minor glitches, claiming that the result was an indicator to the likely trends in the state polls to be held a year later.
2017
From: Subhash Mishra, Saffron sweep in UP civic polls, Cong loses Amethi, December 3, 2017: The Times of India
See graphic:
The results of the elections to local bodies in UP, 2012 and 2017
Seats won and votes polled by the parties
From: Shankar Raghuraman. In polls for heads of tier-2 UP towns, BJP got 29% of votes, December 4, 2017: The Times of India
See graphic:
Seats won and votes polled by the parties in mayoral and nagarpalika polls in December 2017
The headlines on the day of the civic poll results in Uttar Pradesh may have suggested a sweep for the ruling BJP, but that’s just the elections for mayors in the state’s biggest cities, where it won 14 of the 16 up for grabs. An analysis of the polls for theheadsof the next tier of cities — the nagar palika parishad presidents — shows that it notonly won just 35% of theseats, it got a mere 28.6% of the votes. Considering it had polled over 42% in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections and close to that figure in the 2017 assembly polls, this is not great news for BJP. But its main rivalsin thestatehave little reason to cheer, having performed even worse.
BJP’s vote share in the mayoral contests for the municipal corporations was 41.4%, while the three other major parties — SP, BSP and Congress — were left far behind in the15to18% range (see graphic). In the nagar palika parishad presidents’ polls, however, the saffron party could win only roughly one in three seats or 70 of the 198 in the contest, with independents making major inroads. Its vote share of 28.6% was still comfortably ahead of SP’s 21.7% but the gap was nothing like in the mayoral contests.
A regional analysis of the nagar palika parishad presidents’ contests throws up more pointers to the challenges for BJP in the run-up to the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. In two regions that between themselves accounted for 90 of the 98 seats — Central UP and Rohilkhand — SP actually won more seats than BJP and in Central UP even had a higher vote share. Both in 2014 and in the assembly polls, the saffron party had led comfortably in each region of thestate.
The party’s vote share is uniformly lower in every single region ofUP, but the pick-up in the vote share of its rivals is patchy, SP putting up a strong fight in two regions but having sub-20% votesharesin western UP, the northeastern districts and Bundelkhand. BSP seems to have held its own in the southeastern districts and in the west, but yielded the main opposition space to SP in the rest. The Congress’ showing in these lower tiers belies any hopes of revival it might have gotfrom the mayoral polls.
Also worrying for BJP would be the fact that its share of seats– and, wecan besure, of votes– goesdown as thelevelof the contest dips from the biggestcitiestothesmaller onesto the bottom of the urban ladder, the nagar panchayats. In the nagar panchayats, BJPwon only 100 of the 438 presidents’ posts, independents picking up
182. While we have not calculated vote shares for this tier, it is certain that the party’s share wouldbeeven lower than in the nagar palika parishad presidential polls. BJP’s share of seatsin the members of thetwo lower tiers, nagar palika parishad and nagar panchayats, is even less than in the heads of these bodies. Only one in eight elected nagar panchayats members and about one in six nagar palika parishad members isfrom the party.
In the nagar palika parishad presidents’ polls, BJP could win only roughly one in three seats or 70 of the 198 in the contest, with independents making major inroads
Civic bodies: AIMIM marks presence in UP
Winning at least 26 wards in various civic bodies, Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) has opened its account in Uttar Pradesh. In Ghaziabad district, the party candidate has been elected chairman of Dasna Nagar Panchayat.
According to the partywise data compiled by the State Election Commission (SEC), AIMIM bagged 12 municipal councillors’ posts, seven nagar palika parishad members’ posts and six nagar panchayat posts.
The party’s mayoral candidate from Firozabad, Mashroor Fatima, was a runner-up. The winning candidate, Nutan Rathore from BJP, got 98,932 votes which equals to 34.99% vote share while Fatima got 56,536 votes, equalling 19.99% vote share. The total voting percentage of Firozabad stood at 56.16%. State president for AIMIM, Shaukat Ali, said the party’s win was a reply to all those who had termed AIMIM as an agent of BJP.
Mayoral seats: BJP won 14/ 16; BSP 2
Support for BJP in urban areas, which helped the party score a landslide win in the UP state polls earlier this year, appears to have
survived the grouses arising over the implementation of GST, with the party sweeping 14 out of 16 mayoral seats in the state on Friday.
BSP showed signs of a comeback by snatching two seats from BJP, while SP and Congress failed to open their account. Congress lost badly in Amethi, Rahul Gandhi’s Lok Sabha seat.BJP won three newly created corporations — Ayodhya-Faizabad, Mathura-Vrindavan and Saharanpur — and also in Muslim-dominated cities: Moradabad, Bareilly and Firozabad.
BSP show queers pitch for Cong, SP
BJP also won in Agra, frequently referred to as the “Dalit capital” because of the big concentration of Dalits it boasts of.
The resounding victory at the expense of Congress and other rivals comes on the eve of Gujarat polls and should act as a morale-booster for BJP.PM Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah hailed the ‘thumbs-up’ from the UP electorate, the third consecutive one since its massive victory in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.
The reaffirmation in the urban centres, almost all of them with sizeable presence of traders, should also reassure the party which is having to deal with Congress’s attempt to stoke the grouses against GST.
It marks a personal triumph for chief minister Aditya Nath Yogi, who led the party’s campaign by addressing 34 rallies within 15 days.
His rise perhaps brings to an end BJP’s long search post-Kalyan Singh for a leader with an appeal covering the sprawling state, who can hold his own against powerful satraps like Mayawati.
The results suggest a revival of sorts for BSP, especially in western UP where electoral collaboration between Dalits — core constituents — and Muslims prevailed against BJP in Aligarh and Meerut and can politically resuscitate party supremo Mayawati who appeared to be facing an existential crisis.
But by underlining its potential as a possible BJP-beater, BSP has created complications also for SP and Congress, especially considering the trend among Muslims to switch their support to whoever is in the best position to defeat the Hindutva outfit.
While for Congress, the rout only adds to the string of humiliations, SP is under spotlight for failing to open its account . SP has been defeated in its strongholds by BJP, say analysts. SP chief Akhilesh Yadav is already facing criticism for not campaigning and for what is seen as a “casual” approach to politics. In contrast, BJP contested the polls by deploying its well-oiled campaign machinery and even roping in Union ministers.
