Mumbai: Parliamentary elections
This is a collection of articles archived for the excellence of their content. |
After 1977
Mumbai largely anti-Cong in post-1977 era
Anahita Mukherji | The Times of India May 18, 2014
MUMBAI: While the 2014 general election may well be the second time in history that the saffron combine has swept all six Lok Sabha seats from Mumbai, several constituencies in the city have been predominantly anti-Congres for the last three decades.
While the Congres may have been dominant in Maharashtra, its financial capital has had a strong saffron presence from the 1980s, which is reflected in the number of BJP/Sena MPs the city has sent to parliament.
In 1977 and 1980, the Bharatiya Lok Dal-Janata Party dominated Mumbai, with Subramanian Swamy winning two consecutive elections from the Mumbai North East constituency. Mrinal Gore of the Janata Party won from Mumbai North in 1977.
From 1977 to 2014, the Mumbai South and North West constituencies have been the only ones with a strong Congres presence, with 6 of 11 MPs since 1977 belonging to the Congres-NCP combine in each of the two seats. Mumbai South Central and Mumbai North have been largely saffron in hue. Six of 11 MPs from Mumbai South Central have been from the Shiv Sena. From Mumbai North, 6 of 11 MPs have been from the BJP.
The Mumbai North Central constituency is possibly the most diverse. It has sent four MPs each from the BJP-Sena and Congres, one from the RPI, one from Janata Party and one from the CPI(M).
Before 1977, when the arrangement of constituencies was not the same as today, while the Congres won a majority of seats, its main opposition came from communist and socialist parties. These in 1967 won two of five seats; one constituency elected George Fernandes of the Samyukta Socialist Party and the other SA Dange of the CPI.
Explaining the rise of saffron parties in Mumbai, political scientist Jose George said, "The Sena rose as a force in Maharashtra in the 1960s and '70s, and was encouraged by a section of the Congres and industrialists to fight trade unions and the Left... The steady decline of trade unions in the city and the rise of the Hindutva ideology with LK Advani's rath yatra in 1989... helped the saffron combine come to power in the city."
The BJP-Sena's hold over Mumbai can be seen in the fact that it has ruled the municipal corporation for several terms.
2014
Sunando Sarkar | TNN
Mumbai turned saffron with a vengeance, just one election after it blanked out the Shiv Sena-BJP combine from its map. NDA swept all six seats, with both partners bagging three each.
A combination of factors led to the Congres-NCP rout, which has been a once-in-atwo-decades phenomenon in Mumbai; the city ousted Congres in 1977, repeated the washout 19 years later in 1996 and did it again 18 years later.
The two important factors would have to be the Modi wave and the anti-incumbency sentiment playing overtime. Congres and NCP candidates have had to bear the cross of the voters' anger against the UPA-II government, if not against themselves. What made the outcome certain was a simultaneous, almost-en-bloc gravitation of these anti-incumbent votes towards NDA.
These twin forces were so strong that it made the potential spoilers entirely irrelevant to the final result. MNS, which helped the Congres-NCP combine get a tennis set-like, 6-0 margin last time, has struggled to retain its own voter base. It played the role of a passive ally to BJP , refusing to field candidates in the BJP seats. But Raj Thackeray's party failed to spoil even cousin Uddhav Thackeray's party in the three seats where Sena candidates were the NDA representatives.
AAP was reduced to a footnote. It, however, has its supporters--in some seats it has approximated MNS levels-but it has a long way to go to even become a serious spoiler.
