New Delhi, October 22: The Congress has fallen short of a majority in Haryana after results for all seats were declared on Thursday, while it is set to retain power in Maharashtra and sweep Arunachal Pradesh.
Of the 90 assembly seats, for which the results were declared Thursday, the ruling Congress is short of six seats from the magic figure of 46, as independents. ,
The Congress is likely to seek support of Independent candidates, seven of whom won, to form the next government in the state.
With all the results declared, the Congress finished with a tally of 40 followed by INLD, whose ally Shiromani Akali Dal got one seat.
INLD, which has made a significant comeback, won at 31 constituencies in the 90-member House.
Of the remaining 18 seats, Haryana Janhit Congress-BL, a new entrant in assembly polls, got six seats, BJP four and BSP one.
While the Congress suffered major losses conceding 27 seats it won in 2005, the INLD, led by former Chief Minister Om Prakash Chautala, improved its tally to 31 from nine seats it won last time.
Meanwhile, the Congress has offered an olive branch to HJC-BL leader Kuldeep Bishnoi, whose party has won six seats in the assembly.
Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda said Congress was all set to return to power for a second term and the party high command will take a decision on the issue of leadership of the legislature party.
Hooda said he was a candidate for the Chief Minister’s post but “not a claimant. All decisions of the Congress high command will be binding upon me.”
On his earlier assessment that the Congress will make a clean sweep, Hooda admitted “Our assessment on the assembly polls was wrong. We will analyse our performance.”
He, however, said people in Haryana want that Congress should form the government. “We may have got less number of seats, but our vote share is not low,” he said, adding that being the single largest party they would soon meet the Governor to stake claim.
Hooda, however, had the satisfaction of winning with the largest margin 71,200 votes from Garhi Sampla-Kiloi seat.
Buoyed by the improvement in INLD’s tally, Chautala demanded that the Governor should invite the opposition parties first to give them an opportunity to form the government.
“We appeal to the Governor that he should first invite the opposition parties, which have emerged as the largest group. Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda should immediately step down on moral grounds and the Congress should not stake claim to form the government,” he said.
Despite BJP snapping ties with it shortly before the Assembly polls, Chautala said he still has good friends in that party and he would not hesitate in approaching them.
“It is not the political relations that I have with the BJP, but I have personal relations with former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, senior leader L K Advani and BJP chief Rajnath Singh. We will talk to the BJP,” he said, indicating he was not averse to seeking their support.
A number of state ministers including Birender Singh (Uchana Kalan), Mange Ram Gupta (Jind), Lachhman Dass Arora (Sirsa), A C Chaudhary (Faridabad NIT) and Meena Mandal (Nilokheri) lost.
Haryana Congress President Phool Chand Mullana (Mullana), cricketer Yuvraj Singh’s father Yograj Singh (Panchkula) and Haryana Youth Congress President Sanjay Chokhar (Samalkha) were among the prominent losers.
Those who retained their seats included Kiran Chaudhary (Tosham), Randeep Surjewala (Kaithal), Harmohinder Singh Chatha (Pehowa), Ajay Yadava (Rewari), Savitri Jindal (Hissar).
Chautala, whose INLD faced a total rout in the Lok Sabha elections in May, won from two seats – Uchana Kalan and Ellenabad. His son Ajay was elected from Dabwali while his younger brother Ranjit lost as a Congress nominee from Rania.
Other prominent winners include Speaker Raghbir Singh Kadian (Beri), Haryana BJP President Krishan Pal Gujjar (Tigaon), HJC President Kuldeep Bishnoi (Adampur) and former Minister Venod Sharma (Ambala City).
Of the three senior INLD leaders who joined Congress shortly before the assembly polls, only former Finance Minister Sampat Singh won from Nalwa defeating former Chief Minister Bhajan Lal’s wife Jasma Devi.
Two other former INLD leaders — Women’s wing chief Kailsho Saini (Ladwa) and former Lok Sabha MP Sushil Indora Kalanwali (SC) — lost to INLD and SAD nominees.
Former BJP MLA Ram Kumar Gautam, who came into limelight after he criticised the saffron party’s leadership for its alliance with INLD, lost from Narnaund as a nominee of the Congress, which he joined before the elections.
Maharashtra
As per the latest trends, the Congress along with its ally, the NCP, are hovering around the halfway mark with them being ahead/ won in 145 seats in an Assembly of 288. The Shiv Sena-BJP combine is only leading in 91 seats, while Raj Thackeray’s MNS is inching towards victory in 12 seats and others (a majority being rebel candidates) are doing well in 40 seats.
The alliance, which had won 140 seats in the last elections, may end up not needing the support of rebels and independents to form the government.
Congress winners
Of the declared results, Chief Minister Ashok Chavan and party’s points’ man in Konkan, Narayan Rane have emerged victorious from Bhokar and Kudal respectively. Union Power Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde’s daughter Praniti has won from Sholapur Central constituency.
Other prominent leaders of the Congress who have won are former home minister Krupashankar Singh from Kalina and Amit Deshmukh (son of Union Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh) from Latur City.
In Amravati, President Pratibha Patil’s son and Congress candidate Raosaheb Shekhawat has won Amravati Assembly seat after defeating Congress rebel Sunil Deshmukh by a margin of over 5,612 votes.
Congress’ Baba Siddique (Bandra West), Varsha Gaekwad (Dharavi), Suresh Shetty (Andheri East), Prashant Thakur (Panvel), Kalidas Kolambkar (Wadala), Rajendra Gavit (Palghar), Amin Patel (Mumbadevi) and Aslam Shaikh (Malad West) are also amongst the winners.
NCP
Senior leaders Chhagan Bhujbal and Jayant Patil have won from Yeola and Islampur respectively, while Shivendraraje Bhosale has been declared victorious from Satara. Bhujbal’s son Pankaj has also won from Nandgaon constituency.
NCP chief Sharad Pawar’s nephew Ajit has, as expected, won from family bastion Baramati.
Other prominent winners: Ganesh Naik (Belapur), Dilip Valse-Patil (Ambegaon), Gilbert Mendonca (Bhayander), Milind Kamble (Kurla), Hassan Mushriff (Kagal) and Bhaskar Jadhav (Guhagar).
However, senior party leader and state minister Vijaysinh Mohite-Patil has lost to Independent candidate Bharat Bhalke by over 33,000 votes in Pandharpur constituency.
Another senior leader Padmasin Patil is trailing from Osmanabad.
Minister Vinay Kore of Jan Surajya Shakti Party has also tasted success from Shahuwadi in Kolhapur district.
Sena-BJP
Prominent winners from Shiv Sena include Subhash Desai (Goregaon), Bala Sawant (Bandra East), Vinod Ghosalkar (Dahisar), Ravindra Waikar (Jogeshwari) and Ashok Kale (Kopargaon).
However, Leader of Opposition and prominent Shiv Sainik Ramdas Kadam has also lost the elections.
From the BJP, Gopinath Munde’s daughter Pankaja has won Parle, while late Pramod Mahajan’s daughter Poonam is trailing from Ghatkopar constituency.
Other winners in BJP include party Mumbai city chief Gopal Shetty (Borivli), Sudhir Mungantiwar (Ballarpur) and Vishnu Sawra (Bhiwandi-Rural). MNS & others
MNS Chief Raj Thackeray said the victory of the ruling alliance was more due to opposition failure than it was the Congress-NCP combine victory, while thanking the voters for their support. He also announced that his party, which bagged 13 seats, will sit in the opposition.
Addressing mediapersons, he said the MNS had succeeded in created a dent in the votebank of both the BJP-Sena and the Cong-NCP alliance, adding that one more cause of the defeat of the opposition was that they had failed to raise the right issues in the polls.
Also advising the Sena to introspect, he claimed that the political map of Maharashtra will change in the next few years.
Among the prominent MNS winners include Ramesh Vanjale and Uttamrao Dikale who won from Khadakwasla constituency in Pune and Nashik (East) respectively.
Also, party candidates Shishir Shinde (Bhandup), Mangesh Sangle (Vikhroli) and Ramesh Patil (Thane) have managed to secure a place in the state Assembly.
However, party spokesperson Shirish Parkar has lost from Vile Parle in Mumbai.
Don-turned politician Arun Gawli is finding the going tough from his bastion of Byculla in suburban Mumbai.
As expected, Samajwadi Party’s Abu Asim Azmi has won from Bhiwandi East, while his party colleague Rashid Tahir Momin has won from Bhiwandi West.
Cricketer Vinod Kambli has lost from Vikhroli.
Meanwhile BSP, which decided to go alone in Maharashtra, has failed to win any of the 281 seats it had contested out of the total 288 assembly seats there.
In contrast to BSP’s performance, the Third Front formed by Left parties, SP, JD(S) and Republican Party of India (RPI) and smaller Maharashtra based parties like Shetkari Sangathana and Peasants and Workers Party (PWP) managed to win nine seats among them.
The Front, known as Republican Left Democratic Front (RLDF), would be expecting to be included in the government formation as the Congress-NCP bagged 143 seats and may require a few more seats to be comfortably placed in the assembly.
A total of 3,559 candidates, including 211 women, contested the Oct 13 elections.
It is a clean sweep for the Congress in this Northeastern state. Out of the 57 seats for which elections results are available for 55. The Congress has won 39 seats and leading in three others while the BJP has won two seats and NCP has emerged victorious at six places. Others are leading in the nine seats.
“This is a victory for good governance and stability, besides all round development that we were able to bring to the state,” Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Dorjee Khandu said.
“We thank the people of the state for giving us a chance to rule the state for yet another term.” Voting was held for 57 seats with three candidates already declared elected unopposed.
Khandu and two more ruling Congress members were declared elected unopposed – sitting MLA Tsewang Dhondup from Tawang constituency and debutant Jambey Tashi from the Lumla seat.
Khandu was elected unopposed from the Mukto constituency in Tawang district, bordering China, repeating his feat in the 1999 and 2004 assembly elections.
A total of 154 candidates were in the fray with the ruling Congress party fielding candidates in all the 60 seats.
Apart from the Congress party, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) fielded 36 candidates, and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) 22 — although the surprise element was the Trinamool Congress with 28 candidates in the fray.
Of the Trinamool Congress nominees, five are former Congress party ministers and 10 are sitting MLAs from the ruling party who were denied tickets this time.
—Agencies