Madhya Pradesh bypolls: BJP wins 19 out of 28 seats

Bhopal: Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan once again emerged a strong leader as his party won 19 out of the 28 seats in the by-polls concluded on November 3, the BJP got a comfortable majority in the Assembly with providing stability to its eight-month-old government in the state.

While the Opposition Congress could manage only 9 seats as declared results on November 10. With this, the BJP now has 126 MLAs in the 230-member House, while the Congress has 96 legislators. Due to the resignation of one more Congress MLA recently, the effective strength of the House is 229 at present.

The BJP came to power on the back of Jyotiraditya Scindia's dramatic cross-over from the Congress in March this year. The 22 Congress MLAs including six ministers had resigned from the Assembly and walked over to BJP along with Jyotiraditya. It caused the fall of the Kamal Nath-led Congress government in the state.

It is considered that 18 out of 22 MLAs were close supporters of Jyotiraditya. Five Scindia Supporters who contested by-polls on BJP ticket lost the election. But Jyotiraditya has played role as a key factor to BJP on some constituencies, it helped saffron party and Chouhan for an emphatic victory in the state.

"It is a victory of Notetantra (money system) and democracy has lost in the by-polls. The organisational weakness of the Congress in the state is also one of the factors of the defeat while a strong outfit like RSS stands behind BJP. An urgent need to reform the party and the organisation in the state", Ram Niwas Rawat, State Congress working president told the Millennium Post.