Political diary- Chhattisgarh ,Bihar and Madhya Pradesh

Chhattisgarh:

Chhattisgarh will be one of the most affected states due to delimitation of constituencies for Lok Sabha and Assembly seats. Jagdalpur in Bastar, Ambikapur, Surajpur, Premnagar and Paal would be changed into general seats from SC/ST at present. Kanker Lok Sabha seat will become a general seat from ST reserved at present and Janjgir-Korba, presently a general seat will now become a SCC reserved Lok Sabha seat. Ms Karuna Shukla, niece of Atal Bihari Vajpayee and president of All India women's wing of the BJP represents the constituency.

The heavy weights likely to be affected include former minister, Satyanarayan Sharma, whose traditional Mandir Harshoud seat will cease to exist and Ms Renuka Singh, another former minister, whose Prem Nagar seat is being converted into a general seat.

Ms Singh has challenged the recommendations of the Delimitation commission in Supreme Court and opposed the decision of the Cabinet to reduce ST reserved seats for Chhattisgarh Assembly from 34 to 29 and ST reserved seats in Lok Sabha from the state from four to three.

The former chief minister, Ajit Jogi, who represents a general seat-Mahasamund in the Lok Sabha has also pleaded like Jharkhand, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Nagaland, Chhattisgarh should also be exempted from delimitation of constituencies in the coming elections. The elections for the new assembly are due in November this year.

The Chief Minister Raman Singh is hoping that his ambitious 'Rs 3 per kg rice and Rs 10 per litre Kerosene for BPL families' scheme will help the BJP government in Chhattisgarh in wooing the rural voters where 42 per cent of the population lives below the poverty line.

The state BJP leadership recently had reasons celebrate as the party grabbed victory in the recent assembly by-poll in the Naxal stronghold of Keshkal (Bastar).

The saffron party has now decided to put enhanced efforts on the impoverished regions of the state where corruption and delays stops people from getting food grains and kerosene from the Public Distribution System (PDS) as political pundits are of the view that that if the welfare schemes are sincerely implemented the BJP would be able to enjoys its success in the forthcoming assembly election.

Raman Singh has issued instructions to the government officials asking them to maintain strict surveillance to prevent any malfunctioning and corruption in the rice distribution scheme or face stern actions.

Bihar:

The delimitation of constituencies would affect adversely several leaders, including state RJD president, Abdul Bari Sidiuqqui, health minister, Chandra Mohan Rai (Ram Nagar) and sports minister, Janardan Singh Segriwal (Jalalpur), whose constituencies will cease to exist in the coming assembly elections.

Sadhu Yadav, brother-in-law of the Railway Minister, Lalu Prasad Yadav ,who was elected from Gopalganj (general) seat to the Lok Sabha will have to search new constituency as Gopalganj has now become a SC reserved seat ,Ramchandra Paswan, LJP MP and brother of Ram Vilas Paswan and Surajbhan, another MP of LJP will also have to look for new seats as their current seats , Rosera and Balia have been scrapped.

In the 243 state assembly, now, there would be 37 SC and two ST seats and six out of 40 Lok Sabha seats from Bihar would be reserved for SCs

Patna Saheb and Pataliputra will have two new Lok sabha constituencies with changes in the areas of Patna and Barh constituencies. In Patna, there will be one new assembly seat from Kumhrar, which would be carved out from the existing Patna South, Masaurhi and Phulwari constituencies.

Nitish Kumar’s JD (U) has decided to don the political cap with the party now working to make its presence felt between the OBCs and the Minorities. MJ Akbar, who once successfully contested for the MP seat from Kishanganj (Bihar) is all set for a comeback, though this time he will be going to the Upper house courtesy JD (U).

Madhya Pradesh:

If the Lok Sabha elections are held immediately in Madhya Pradesh, the Congress would be gainer .The past trends of the by-elections also indicate, the BJP would be loser, as in all the by-elections, the BJP lost the seats won by it in the last elections. The BJP lost the Khargone Lok Sabha seat to the Congress in November. In the summer, the party could not retain the seat it had won in 2004 elections in Shivpuri.

The recent 60000 crores debt relief relief given to the Kisans by the finance minister, P Chidambaram, will definitely help gain the support of the cotton growers of Khargone-Khanwda and soyabean growers of Malwa region and also in central Madhya Pradesh. Many farmers had committed suicide in these regions due to heavy loans.

The former chief minister, Ms Uma Bharti, who would be fielding her candidates against the BJP, would also help the Congress in a triangular contest.

Politically stating Congress is on a revival mode after Suresh Pachori was made the state PCC chief recently. The old PCC had virtually become defunct under Subhash Yadav and inspite of many opportunities presented by the BJP, the PCC was no abe to successfully utilize them. Now the workers are hoping for a change in fortune under Pachori as he is more taller than Yadav and commands more respect among the senior leaders like Digvijay Singh, Jyotiraditya Scinda and that would help him to silent the intra-party fighting that has been brewing for quite a while now.

The Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) was hoping on using the Ram Sethu issue for electoral gains in Madhya Pradesh but it got a rude shock as the Ramsetu issue backfired as was clear from its performance in the Karnataka local body elections where the Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) emerged as the winner.

BJP and Congress both have shifted their spotlight to the sizeable number of tribal votebank in Madhya Pradesh. This was evident after LK Advani chose Jabalpur to launch his 'sankalp yatra' while Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made a visit to the remote tribal belt of Jhabua.

Tribals dominate both Jhabua and Jabalpur regions. They play a decisive role in 91 of the state's 230 assembly constituencies. Of these, 41 are reserved for the community.

Tribals would play an even more significant role if the delimitation of constituencies takes place before the polls. Under the new system, the number of tribal seats would go up.

The significant of the tribal vote was demonstrated in the 2003 assembly polls at Nimar, Malwa, Mahakaushal and Vindhya regions. The BJP swung 15 percent of the tribal votes away from the Congress and won three-fourths of the tribal seats.

Though recent trends suggest that the Tribals appear to have distanced themselves from BJP as was evident in Khargone Lok Sabha and Sanver and Lanjhi assembly by-polls which the BJP lost.

Another important part in the whole picture is to be played by Gondwana Ganatantra Party (GGP), which has substantial strength in the tribal areas of the Mahakoshal region.

Both the BJP and the Congress are wary of GGP and if the Gonds in the Mahakoshal region, where 60 percent of the voters are tribals, decide to go with GGP, the electoral prospects of the two mainstream parties will surely suffer.

Similarly Mayawati’s BSP which recently organized a show of strength in Bhopal, will also give sleepless night to both BJP and Congress strategist as BSPs policy of wooing the Brahmin vote bank is sure to change the political equations in the state.