MATHIHALLI MADAN MOHAN writes from Hubli: If one were to adopt the language of cricket to the Lok Sabha elections in Karnataka, it is the extras, which make the difference between victory and defeat for the contesting parties.
This may sound strange but it is apparent to all those who have been looking closely at the electoral performanance in elections over the years. The “extras” are those who have maintained strict political neutrality in the assembly elections but have exercised their vote in favour of either of the national parties in the LS elections.
Therefore, as far as the State goes, it does not matter whether the general elections and assembly elections are held simultaneously or separately after an interval of one or two years.
The latest example of the classic trend was the 2004 elections, when the two elections were held simultaneously. It was noticed that the number of neutral voters who had stayed away from the main national parties in the assembly segments was around 38.30 lakhs out of the total valid 251.29 lakh voters.
In the Lok Sabha polls, though, nearly half of them chose to express their preference for either the BJP or Congress. As a result, the BJP picked up an additional 16 lakhs votes over and above what the party had received in the assembly polls held at the same time, to notch up a total of 87.32 lakh votes, while the Congress got additional support to the extent of 3.86 lakhs to end up with a tally of 92.47 lakhs. The JDS got a paltry addition of 65,000 voters.
A similar trend was noticed when simultaneous elections were held in 1989, and during separate elections held after a brief interregnum as in 1983 (assembly) and 1984 (Parliament), or 1994 (assembly) and 1996 (Parliament).
If this trend were to hold good in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections, too, the performanance of the parties in the 2008 assembly elections would be a benchmark, with a motley crowd of around 34 lakh voters holding the key in deciding the political fortunes of the three parties, namely the BJP, Congress and JDS, each of which have their own political agenda.
This bunch of 34 lakh voters out are of the 2.60 crore voters in an electorate of 4 crores who had taken a politically neutral stand in the assembly elections and had kept the main political parties at bay while bestowing attention on the smaller parties, independents and others.
A chart specially prepared to interpret the 2008 assembly election results in terms of the parliamentary constituencies going to polls, reveals quite an interesting picture on the behavioural pattern and ground realities of the balance of political power.
It is seen that out of the polled voters of 260.13 lakh votes, the three main parties picked up 89.80 lakhs (Congress), 87.79 lakhs (BJP) and 49.34 lakhs (JDS) for the 80, 110 and 28 seats respectively, while 33.78 lakh voters (12.98%) had gone to the “others” category, from which six independents had emerged victorious (all whom are now a part of the ruling BJP government.
After the byelections to the eight assembly constituencies, the situation underwent a small change, with the BJP improving its position slightly, picking up 1.96 lakh additional voters and five additional assembly seats, the JDS retaining one and picking up two additional seats while its votes tally saw erosion to the extent of 72,000.
The Congress failed to retain or win any of the eight, and its vote count dipped by 74,000 votes.
But in terms of the parliamentary constituencies, the BJP, the Congress led in 12 each and the JDS in the remaining four. That situation hardly changed after the byelections to the eight assembly constituencies.
# The twelve constituencies, where the Congress has a lead are as follows: Chikkodi (+79,000), Bijapur (+25,000), Gulbarga (+41,000), Raichur (+54,000), Bidar and Koppal (+13,000), Dakshina Kannada (+5,000), Chitradurga (+36,000), Mysore (+56,000), Chamarajanagar (+1.10 lakh), Chikballapur (+69,000) and Kolar (+55,000).
# The twelve constituencies, where the BJP has a lead are as follows: Belgaum (+56,000), Bagalkot (+66,000), Bellary (+1.04 lakhs), Haveri (+60,000), Dharwad (+97,000), Uttara Kannada (+5,000), Davangere (+1.31 lakhs), Shimoga (1.18 lakhs), Udupi (+76,000), Bangalore North (+4,000), Bangalore Central (+55,000), and Bangalore South (+31,000).
# The four constituencies where the JDS is in the lead are: Hassan (+76,000), Tumkur (+31,000), Mandya (+1.31 lakhs) and Bangalore Rural (+35,000).
It can be seen that in only six constituencies, the lead for the parties is near and more than one lakh votes, of which four—Bellary, Davangere , Shimoga, and Dharwad—are with the BJP, with the Congress (Chamarajanagar) and JDS (Mandya) having one each.
It is in this context that the presence of 33.78 lakh votes neutral votes clubbed under the “others” category in the chart assumes significance. It can be seen that the average size of this category of voters is more than one lakh per constituency, with the number crossing the two-lakh mark in the three constituencies of Chitradurga, Mandya and Chamarajnagar. And in 10 constituencies it is less than one lakh and it is least in the four Bangalore constituencies, Bangalore Rural North, Central and South.
The question is how many of the neutral category may prefer to cast votes?
If the 2004 performanance is any guide, it is around 50%—which in this case around is 16 lakh voters.
Whom would they vote for? Again going by the previous experience, the BJP may get a lion share, followed by Congress and JDS.
In 16 constituencies, the parties have a lead of more than 50,000 votes. One can safely assume that it should be possible for them to retain the same. And the problem comes only in the remaining 12 constituencies, where the lead is less than 50,000 and it is here that the “sundries” become crucial for each of the parties.
After reading the article, I am unable to find out how the writer has quantified the number of these mysterious voters, who are these voters and where are they? That might have helped the candidates target their propaganda to these voters.
The table shows an assumption that all the voters who have voted for specific parties continue to do so in future, and “others” will keep shifting their loyalty. That seems rather simplistic.
good analysis, but in loksabha election, people tend to vote more in favor of national parties. see seatwise pre poll prediction for karnataka by one of reader of my blog
http://promiseofreason.com/karnataka-seatwise-prepoll-prediction-by-shanthesh/
Superb analysis sir…
Till people stop voting for a bottle of liquor/100 rupee note/tv/… these kind of results are not a surprise.
Why blame only people contesting politicians are not able to communicate to people why they should be voted to power (their agenda, track record,…). They are busy dividing poeple on the basis religion, caste, sub caste, family name….
One Observable thing, 8 months of BJP has dissapointed atleast a bunch of its hardcore supporters. And JDS seem to have revived itself atleast in old mysore region . congress as usal a sleeping party only wakes up during elections.
So it will be tough triangular in karnataka.
***
By the way, vidhansabha elections are the only indicaor of LS elections.
LS is less attractive to people than VS. VS has candidates spread over each region whereas in LS its wide spread.
So definatly this can be considered as a indicator.Things can go completly wrong here.
For example :
take JDS in bangalore central. in VS it had no chance.now after sharief is out of context zameer has taken front place here.Such candidate based voting affects the normal Vs pattern.
A united opposition in the form of Cong+JDS could have made some difference in many sears.. As of now, BJP is well on the way to winning most of the State’s LS Seats.
This is by way of clarification to the doubts expressed by Mr Gururaj. There is no mystery about the number. In every election you have voters voting for the national parties and smaller parties of their choice. Categorise the votes cast for Congress, BJP and the JDS, who are the main contenders in Karnataka, and the others. The last category includes those who have voted for their own reasons for smaller parties and independents and have clearly steered clear of the major poltiical parties. You can always quantify such number in any election.
As I have put this number of around 38 lakhs in 2004 elections and 33.78 lakhs in the 2008 election.
When simultaneous elections were held for Lok Sabha and Assembly in karnataka in 2004, one could notice that the two major parties, have picked up more votes in the parliament segment than they had got in the assemblly. These extra votes, as one could find with a little calculation from the “others” category. In the 2004 elections, fifty per cent of such votes had gone to the national parties, as I have made it amply clear.
It is not possible to identify the voters individually but the group can be identified.
Whatever the parties get in the assembly elections, represents the core poltiical support of voters, cast for them for whatever reason. It is over this base of core support, the political edifice of the parties is built in the Lok Sabha election.
Mathihalli Madan Mohan
I appreciate the hard work behind your survey.I think my last post was bit misleading.
There are several factors in this LS election.
1) The LS elections are not happening.It is happening after 9 months in which BJP has seen way too many problems for a any new government.Literally every month saw a issue which government find it tough to handle with its relative inexperience.
This could erode a chunk of BJP votes which could have negative impact on it.
2) It was a wrong strategy to go for Operation kamala.I had voted to BJP 6 times.Even when Devegowda had stood against tejaswini i had voted for BJP.Such was my belief in them.But i don’t think it is anymore ideal party it seemed to be under vajpayee.
3) Individual personalities will have a major role in many constituentcy. Ex: Jameer ahmed khan. I believe he is a winning horse not because of his party.his party has no base there.But it is his religion and lack of competation.
3) Last time there was no internal understanding.See things in more braoder way. You will sense understanding in each and every seat.
Right from mysore to bangalore central to chikkaballapura I see a internal understanding webbed in a very calculative manner.This could prove a very vital factor.
Saying all these my predictions are
BJp -12-14
Congress – 10-12
Jds – 5-7
Thank You!!, for the painstaking Explanation. Grateful!
That is really good research piece.
Good analysis. However, I think one point needs to be made. The 34 lakhs or so that is mentioned only constitute the ‘others’ from among the people the polled voters. There is a large pool of over a crore of non polled voters. Even a marginal change in the non polled number could make a huge difference.
Thanks for a nice piece of analysis with numbers. It is refreshing to see this kind of analysis using existing real data.
Faldo is right. Even a slight improvement in the polling would make lot of difference to the fortunes of the political parties. Unfortunately this does not happen. Around 40 percent of the electorate stays awayfrom the poll on an average and a party which comes to power has a lesser percentage share of support that those who have abstained.
But nobody including the Election Commisison or the political parties have bothered to find out why such a big number of voters stay away or what makes them stay away or whether it is possible to make them change their mind and vote. One reason for this kind of indifference is that is more people come, it would mean more work and who wants it anyway in the present circumstances. The political parties are happy if their own flock turns out in their support.
It is because of this that the political orientation or otherwise of the “other” category of voters assumes significance.
Secondly about the points raised by Nripatunga on the voters disillusionment regarding the BJP’s rule in Karnataka. Disillusionment hardly translates into vote as we have experienced so far. We deride papers and the electronic channels openly but we hardly stop subsrcibing to the papers or seeing the channels.
Voting is some kind a habit, an additction that we develop for Tea or Coffee. Once accumstomed to it we hardly change. Once person has voted for a party for any reason, he hardly changes his inclination in the subsequent elections. Despite all the known dissillusionment, the voting pattern is not likely to change.
The moot point is that what the choice available, if a BJP voters wants to change hismind. The Congress and the JDS are still worse. Willy nilly he has to vote for the BJP. and he has no choice.
Like that
@MMM, you have an interesting take on how people are either addicted to voting or totally disinterested. However, in many cases there are genuine reasons that keep people away. I remember reading an article long ago about how despite the election commission’s best efforts, the people skip voting because of something more pressing.
For some in rural areas it could be a choice between getting their daily meal or going out to vote, for others it could mean a day lost in work on the field or some where else. For many urban people they don’t vote because they are working on providing essential services or have jobs requiring them to travel or move from place to place. The sheer distance to the polling booth also is a factor in some regions.
I would like to add something more to what Mr Madan Mohan has said.
You can add another nine lakhs to the voters who may decide the fate of the three parties in the Loksabha polls. They are the new voters, who have enrolled between the assembly and loksabha elections.\
As election statistics go to show, the new electors invariably prefer the BJP. This is evident from the voting pattern in three elections held between 1999 to 2008, when around 50 lakh new voters were added and 35 lakh had exercised franchise.
The Congress and JDS did not get a single extra vote. As a matter fact the Congress lost marginally in its vote tally. All the new votes went to BJP. And it is this, which has helped the BJP to close the gap between itself and the Congress during the period.
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Mathihalli Madan Mohan
No they are not that simple.If i remember properly in 1999 Congress had sweeped Bjpaur.Yet they lost loksabha elections.The Candidate yatnal seemed to have done trick here.
1) So this is major factor which needs to be considered here.Personality and Identity of candidate.Ex: a person who voted for yogeshwar in chennapattana may not vote for him again seeing a better candidate.
2) Tactical Voting by voters – This is done by a small percentage of voters yet this is very decisive. Ex: minorities who might have supported a JDS candidate in VS election might not vote for them keeping congress candidate winnability factor in mind.
3) Rebel factor – Many congress mla’s of kolar have openly decalred support to BJP candidate and working for it to defeat muniyappa.This removes a decisive number of voters away from party.
4) Local identity – When i see the candidates of Lok sabha and i see a leader whom i know very well because he is of my area, but i had voted for other person in VS elections because he was a better candidate.But now in LS election things have changed and i see the lost candidate from my area standing in LS election and he is the only one from area.So one sympathy factor could work here and local identity might make you vote for that person.
PS: BTW, i do not agree to your argument of BJP being better than other parties.Congress does seem to have better edge than its rivals when it comes to governence.
Mr Nripatunga
1999 facts about Assembly elections are otherwise.
In the Bijapur district, the Congress had won threee seats – Muddehibal, Hippparigi, Ballolli, the BJP had won three seats too, namely B.Bagewadi, Bijapur, Tikota, while the remaining two seats of Indi and Sindgi went to independents. In the Loksabha poll, which was held simultaneously the the BJP led in all exept twoassembly segments of Muddebihal and Hipparigi
In terms of voters also, the Congress had polled 2.97 lakhs in assembly segments, while in the parliament segment, it had got an extra 15,000 votes (3.12 lakhs).
On the other hand, the BJP had polled 1.46 lakhs in the assembly segments while its tally in loksabha was almost doubled (3.48 lakhs)
There were two important reasons for the BJP tally going up in parliament segment. The JDU which had polled 88,799 votes in the assembly had not contested the parliament poll. The JDS, which had polled 47,401 in assembly suffered some erosion (38,398 votes) and “other catgeory” of voters were to the extent of 1.29 lakhs)
One can easily deduce from which source the BJP got the support in the loksabha election.
Any how thanks for your watchful eye and interest
Mathihalli Madan Mohan
1. I wonder where you got the table of 2008 assembly results set in parliamentary constituencies. What is your source? Why do I ask? Because it is very different from the table published by Times of India (dharwad /davangere edition), on Thursday April 9th 2009. Page 4 gives a completely different figure of each of the parliamentary constituency.
2. It is not just non-polled voters of 2008, it is also new, young voters who are added this year. We have no idea, how these voters will vote.
3. By and large, I agree, core supporters of a party will continue to vote for their pet party, no matter what. It is only the floating voters who will seal the fate of the political parties
Good analysis.