LS Elections 2014 - Result Highlights - C,D

Chandigarh
- Kirron Kher of the BJP won her seat from Chandigarh against Pawan Kumar Bansal of INC and Gul Panag of AAP.
- Kirron Kher was contesting her first LS election.
- Pawan Kumar Bansal is a  four time MP from Chandigarh for INC. He was forced to resign because his nephew was allegedly implicated in a Railway bribery scam.
- Gul Panag had an active presence online on Twitter, Facebook etc.

 Chattisgarh
- BJP won 10 out of 11 constituencies. INC won 1. Exact copy of the results from LS elections in 2009, w.r.t. numbers.
- BJP lost the Durg constituency to INC as compared to 2009.
- INC lost the Korba constituency to BJP  as compared to 2009.
- Activist Soni Sori was the star candidate from Bastar for AAP but failed to win against Dinesh Kashyap (son of former MP) of BJP.


Dadar Nagar Haveli
- BJP regained their seat from the single constituency.

Daman & Diu
- BJP regained their seat from the single constituency.

Delhi
- BJP made a clean sweep over all the 7 constituencies in Delhi. INC had won all the 7 seats in 2009.
- BJP, AAP and INC had well known candidates from all the seven constituencies and therefore was supposed to be a tough fight for all.
- My personal surprises were: Bhojpuri actor Manoj Tiwari of BJP winning a Delhi seat; Journalist Ashish Khetan of AAP who is well known for exposing many scams losing; Social activist Rakhi Birla of AAP losing; Grandson of Mahatma Gandhi, Rajmohan Gandhi of AAP losing; Former journalist and social activist Jarnail Singh of AAP, well known for fighting for Sikh causes losing from a constituency with majority of Sikhs.
- Parvesh Verma of the BJP is the son of former Delhi Chief Minister Sahib Singh Verma who won the West Delhi seat. He also has criminal charges against him.

LS Elections 2014 - Result Highlights - A,B

Andaman & Nicobar
- With just a single constituency, the seat went to BJP. (1 for BJP in LS 2009)

Arunachal Pradesh
- The West constituency going to BJP and the East one to Congress. (2 for Congress in LS 2009)

Assam
- TMC or CPI or CPI(M) not able to win a single seat.
- 7 seats went to BJP (4 in LS 2009) and 3 to Congress (7 in LS 2009) out of a total of 14 constituencies.
- AIUDF (All India United Democratic Front) getting 3 seats (1 in LS 2009)

Bihar
- 22 seats went to BJP (12 in LS 2009), 2 to Congress (2 in LS 2009)
- 2 seats went to JD(U) of Nitish Kumar (20 in LS 2009) who had cut its ties to BJP in this election. It was part of NDA before in LS 2009.
- 4 seats to RLD of Lalu Prasad Yadav (4 in LS 2009). RLD was in alliance with INC before and parts of Fourth front in LS 2009 but later gave support to INC.
- 6 seats to LJP of Ram Vilas Paswan (0 in LS 2009). LJP won 6 of 7 seats it contested in alliance with BJP after 12 years. Half of the party was part of the Paswan family.
- 3 to RLSP (Rashtriya Lok Samata Party) (0 in LS 2009). It contested only on 3 seats in alliance with BJP.
- Giriraj Singh of BJP won his seat from Nawada. He was in the news for the following statements:
"voters who do not vote for Modi shall have to find a place in Pakistan" & "all terrorists caught in the country belong to one particular community"
- Ram Kripal Yadav of BJP won his seat from Patliputra. Before LS 2014, he was with Lalu Prasad Yadav's  RJD and won the LS 2004 elections  from Patna. He won against Lalu Prasad Yadav's daughter, Misa Bharti.
- Rajiv Pratap Rudy of BJP won his seat from Sawan. He won against Lalu Prasad Yadav's wife, Rabri Devi. He was part of a controversy of not paying his hotel bills when he was civil aviation minister in 2004.
- Shahnawaz Huassain of BJP lost his seat from Bhagalpur against RJD candidate. He is one of the prime Muslim faces of the BJP.
- Meira Kumar of INC lost her seat against BJP candidate Chhedi Paswan of BJP. Meira Kumar is five time member of parliament and appointed the first woman speaker of LS in 2009. Chhedi Paswan was with JD(U) till last year.
- Pappu Yadav of RJD won his seat from Madhepura against Sharad Yadav of JD(U). Pappu Yadav had been associated with various parties in the past like SP, LJP, Independent. He was convicted and the acquitted in a murder case of a CPI(M) leader.  
- The BJP had a good strategy of only fielding 30 candidates of its own and the rest 10 seats with pre-poll alliances. The allies got 9 out of 10 seats.

Incidentally, I was reading an article today which said "16th Lok Sabha will be the richest, have most MPs with criminal charges". I think it fits well with the Bihar and UP results.

LS Elections 2014 - Observations

As a school going boy, I remember that I was the most politically challenged person. I had no clue about political parties, their functioning and even the process of our Indian political system. I was so naive that I  did not even knew the difference between the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. I think I was never even motivated to look for answers. Those were relatively easier times, I guess.

Fast forward to 2014. Not only do I know the Indian political and election system today, I also know the complete election process and political scenario of two foreign lands, USA and Germany. Time fly so fast that I find it unbelievable sometimes. I am a person who hates politics to the core, yet I find it hard to explain myself, why do I need to know all these things. Maybe, I have a large appetite for useless things.

Anyways, after collecting the candidate data from major political parties in India, I came across many interesting facts. Either I am still naive to notice them or either I just over analyze stuff. I thought of compiling the points which I found quite amusing. For some readers it might be redundant or useless information. To some extent, BJP is an exception but INC and AAP are guilty of same.

1. Something which I found particularly frustrating was that almost all political parties change their declared candidates without officially announcing it separately in their press releases. This makes it very difficult to track the changes. They simply update their complete list without highlighting the individual updates.

2. Last weekend, I saw a glimpse of a TV interview of MNS chief Raj Thackeray with Rajdeep Sardesai while visiting a friend. He quite bluntly said that non Maharashtrians should not live or work in Maharashtra, thereby standing against anything foreign. It was amusing to see the website of MNS not only in Marathi but also in English. Shiv Sena on the other hand has its website only in Marathi, making it almost impossible to read it for a non Marathi speaking person.

3. It was also quite a let down to see Telugu Desam Party's website. Majority of it was in Telugu and surprisingly no list of candidates. The same go for the YSR Congress Party website. This is the reason why I have no list of candidates from AP in my list. I cannot comment much on YSR but was quite disappointed to see such an unprofessional looking website of TDP, a party with a man who was responsible for bringing IT to AP and thus helping the state in a big way.

4. I was quite impressed by the regional parties of UP like BSP and SP maintaining their websites in a professional way, although for a long time they did not updated it with the list of candidates or any information regarding the LS elections 2014.

5. I was also very impressed by other regional parties like TMC, CPI(M), BJD running and updating their websites professionally. Something I observed and which amused me looking at the footnote on the CPI(M) website was a phrase, labeled "Support Free Software". Quite in line with the party's ideologies. And who could have imagined RJD also maintaining a website, that as well in English. At least, not me.

6. As a general comment, I could see INC making all the correct noise on its website against their biggest rivals, i.e. the BJP in the run up to the election but did not see all those points converting into news on mainstream media. I think INC is missing a good spokesperson. BJP website on the other hand is only about its prime ministerial candidate with his corporate type graphs and bullet points for development.

I find it funny or rather a paradox when I see the current political situation and the definition of the process of electing a prime minister which states: The elected members of the majority party of the Lok Sabha "elect" the prime minister of India. Apparently, that prime ministerial candidate is already decided even before the elections actually takes place. Democracy is so overrated !

P.S: I am not inclined to any political party.

The road to power is paved with  hypocrisy and casualties. Never regret ! - Francis J. Underwood (House of Cards)

List - W

INC: Indian National Congress
BJP: Bhartiya Janta Party
AAP: Aam Aadmi Party
TMC: Trinamool Congress
CPI: Communist Party of India
CPI(M): Communist Party of India (Marxist)

List - U

INC: Indian National Congress
BJP: Bhartiya Janta Party
AAP: Aam Aadmi Party
SP: Samajwadi Party
BSP: Bahujan Samajwadi Party
RLD: Rashtriya Lok Dal
TMC: Trinamool Congress
CPI: Communist Party of India
CPI(M): Communist Party of India (Marxist)