
LUCKNOW: Belying the claims of political pundits, the Opposition INDIA bloc served a massive blow to the NDA across Uttar Pradesh —from the Jat land of western UP to Purvancha in far east – in the Lok Sabha elections. Result: Narendra Modi-led NDA slipped to 36, losing 28 seats from its tally of 64 in 2019.
In the strongholds of both PM Modi and UP CM Yogi Adityanath, the seats of the ruling alliance slipped to half. Moreover, the impact of an anti-dispensation sentiment was reflected in Modi’s victory margin which shrunk to one-third of the previous one in 2019. Moreover, seven – Smriti Irani, Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti, Dr Mahendra Chandra Pandey, Ajay Mishra Teni, Sanjeev Baliyan, Kaushal Kishore and BPS Verma -- of the 11 Union ministers ended up losing their seats.
According to political experts, despite changing its narrative with each phase from west to east through Awadh, Bundelkhand , Rohilkhand and Braj region, the BJP failed to impress the voters.
The issues like price rise, Agniveer, paper leak and unemployment raised by the opposition, and the narrative peddled around change of the Constitution and taking way the reservation for the poor had a better resonance on the ground and it resulted in BJP’s loss of seats in each phase and in each region of the state.
Registering an overall drop of 8% in its vote share, the BJP could win 14 of the 26 seats which went to poll in the first three phases spread across the western UP against 18 seats it had won 2019. The opposition alliance improved its tally by winning 11 against four in 2019. One seat, Nagina (SC), was been won by Chandrashekhar Azad of Azad Samaj Party.
Of the 24 seats of Awadh region which went to poll in fourth and fifth phases, BJP won 11 against a clean sweep in 2019. The INDIA bloc wrested 13 seats of the region where they had failed to open account in previous election.
Similarly, of the four Bundelkhand seats, where the BJP and allies had been relying on the development narrative, NDA ended up losing three seats to the opposition. BJP had been making a clean sweep in Bundelkhand since 2014. In Purvanchal, the stronghold of Modi and Yogi, BJP lost 17 of 27 seats. It had won 20 of 27 in 2019.
The ‘Do Ladkon ki Jodi’ in SP chief Akhilesh Yadav and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi worked this time unlike in 2017 when they were seen campaigning together for the UP Assembly polls. Among the biggest talking points in this polls was construction of Ram temple in Ayodhya. But BJP lost Faizabad in which Ayodhya comes.
How fort UP crumbled
BJP registered an overall drop of 8% in its vote share; it won 14 of the 26 seats which went to polls in the first 3 phases in western UP against 18 seats which it won 2019. The SP-Cong alliance won 11 against 4 which it won in 2019.