MP, Karnataka before Puducherry: How Congress lost govts in 2 other states

The Puducherry government’s collapse on Monday means that the Congress has lost three governments in three straight years before completing their full terms.

V Narayanasamy resigned as Puducherry chief minister on Monday after losing a trust vote on the floor of the House. The collapse of the Congress-led government means that since 2019, the party has lost power in two states and a Union territory, without the completion of the full term of the respective governments. Before Puducherry, it had lost power in Madhya Pradesh (March 2020) and Karnataka (July 2019).

File photo of a Congress rally

The Congress could have lost another government, in Rajasthan last July, but managed to hold on. Here’s what happened in Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, before Puducherry:

Karnataka: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) emerged as the single-largest party in assembly elections in May 2018, ahead of the ruling Congress and the Janata Dal (Secular). The latter two then joined hands, with HD Kumaraswamy of the JD(S) becoming the chief minister. However, the government collapsed after rebellion by more than a dozen Congress-JD(S) lawmakers in July 2019. The BJP then came to power and in December, won 12 out of 15 seats for which byelections were held, thus adding enough seats to its tally to cross the majority mark. Several of the Congress-JD(S) defectors joined the BJP and were subsequently made ministers in the BS Yediyurappa government.

Madhya Pradesh: The Congress ended the BJP’s 15-year-rule in the central state in the December 2018 assembly elections. Veteran leader Kamal Nath was preferred over Jyotiraditya Scindia as the chief minister. Eventually, in March last year, Scindia, aggrieved over a host of issues, joined the BJP and was made a Rajya Sabha MP. Several lawmakers loyal to Scindia also jumped ship, triggering the Kamal Nath government’s collapse and the BJP’s return to power after just 15 months. The BJP subsequently won 19 out of 28 assembly seats for which bypolls were held in November, and several defectors were inducted into Shivraj Singh Chouhan’s government.

Rajasthan: The western state was one among three where the Congress defeated the BJP in late 2018. Here, too, just like MP, former CM Ashok Gehlot was appointed to the top post instead of Sachin Pilot, who was made his deputy. The two never got along, and in July 2020, ‘Team Pilot’ rebelled, with rumours linking him to the BJP. However, Pilot did not join the saffron party, instead coming back to the Congress ranks after a three-member panel was formed to address various issues raised by him. The panel comprised Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, KC Venugopal and the late Ahmed Patel. Gehlot went on to win a trust vote and save his government.

The Congress was also a part of the 'Mahagathbandhan' which came to power in Bihar in late 2015. However, it was the junior partner to the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and Janata Dal (United). The JD(U) left the alliance in July 2017 to join the BJP and form government in Bihar. The four states then contributed significantly in the BJP’s re-election at the Centre in 2019, when it won 303 seats on its own, up from 282 in 2014.