In the last phase of polling for Lok Sabha elections, the Malwa-Nimad region in Madhya Pradesh, the area with maximum seats, goes to polls on May 19 driving bigwigs of the Congress and BJP to focus on the region.
The BJP had won all the eight parliamentary constituencies in the region in 2014 polls.
The constituencies include Indore, Ratlam (ST), Khandwa, Khargone (ST), Dhar (ST), Mandsaur, Dewas (SC) and Ujjain (SC). Thus, Malwa-Nimad region has five seats reserved for scheduled tribes and scheduled castes out of 10 constituencies reserved for them in the state. As many as 14.9 million voters will decide the fate of 82 candidates.
Read: Full coverage of Lok Sabha elections 2019
The Congress draws strength from the statistics of state assembly elections held hardly six months back when it won 35 seats against its rival BJP’s 28 and Independent 3.
The Congress’ significant gain could be gauged from the fact that the BJP had had almost a clean sweep in the region during state assembly elections in 2013 when it bagged as many as 56 seats out of the total 66 in the region and Congress had to be content with just 9 seats. The Congress had significant gains in seats reserved for SC/ST too.
While the Congress is highlighting its government’s steps to waive crop loans of farmers and provide 100 days employment to educated unemployed youth besides several public welfare schemes, the BJP has been accusing the government of misleading the farmers and youth in the state and doing nothing except transfer officials .
{{/usCountry}}While the Congress is highlighting its government’s steps to waive crop loans of farmers and provide 100 days employment to educated unemployed youth besides several public welfare schemes, the BJP has been accusing the government of misleading the farmers and youth in the state and doing nothing except transfer officials .
{{/usCountry}}Read: All about Khandwa constituency in Madhya Pradesh
The BJP is confident about repeating its performance of 2014 citing the ‘Narendra Modi wave’ and also the alleged failure of the state government in fulfilling its promises.
On Indore seat, the fight is between BJP’s Shankar Lalwani and Congress’ Pankaj Sanghvi after the BJP leadership decided to drop the sitting MP and Lok Sabha speaker Sumitra Mahajan. The BSP has fielded Deepachand Ahilwal.
In Khandwa, former state presidents of the BJP and the Congress Nandkumar Singh Chauhan and Arun Yadav have locked horns. Chauhan is the sitting MP and the BSP has fielded Dayaram Korku.
In Khargone (ST) constituency,the BJP’s Gajendra Patel and Congress candidate Govind Mujalda both are new candidates for the parties. The BSP has fielded Amit Balke while CPI has chosen Jyoti Gore as its candidate.
In Ratlam (ST) constituency, sitting MP and Congress candidate Kantilal Bhuria, who was defeated in 2014 polls but won a by-election, is facing challenges from the BJP candidate GS Damor. The latter is only sitting MLA who has been fielded by the BJP in the election. The Bahujan Samaj Party has fielded Madhu Patel.
Read: Ratlam has been a Congress bastion
In Dhar (ST) constituency, the BJP’s former MP Chhatar Singh Darbar has locked horns with Congress’ Dinesh Girwal. The BSP has fielded Gulsingh Gawache.
Dewas (SC) seat will see an interesting fight between a folk singer Prahlad Tipania fielded by the Congress and Mahendra Solanky contesting as a BJP candidate. Solanky has been a member of judicial service. The BSP has chosen Badrilal Akela as its candidate.
Arif Firozia of the BJP, Babulal Malvia of the Congress and and Parmar of the BSP are the main contenders in Ujjain (SC) seat.
In Mandsaur constituency, which had seen a massive farmers agitation in 2017 during which police bullets allegedly killed five farmers, the BJP has relied on the candidature of Sudhir Gupta again opposite ex-MP of the Congress Meenakshi Natrajan and BSP’s Prabualal Meghwal.
Gauam Kothari, head of Peethampur Audyogic Sangthan, Dhar said, “In the past 30 years none of our representatives of Malwa-Nimad did anything significant for the development of the region. This is the reason why Malwa has poor rail connectivity, poor health scenario and poor educational facilities and poor infrastructure.”