In the 18th Lok Sabha election, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) faced a setback in Jharkhand, a state that is predominately tribal and has INDIA as its bloc which surprised BJP by winning seats from them.
The BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) won nine seats out of the total 14 Lok Sabha seats in State while Jharkhand Mukti Morcha led INDIA bloc bagged five. In the 2019 election NDA had won 12 out of 14 seats. However, despite visiting Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah, BJP could not replicate its performance.
South Chotanagpur & Kolhan
Even heavyweight candidates like Union Minister Arjun Munda and former Jharkhand Chief Minister Madhu Kora’s wife Geeta Kora lost. The saffron party managed to win just one seat in South Chotanagpur region out of three contested. Khunti seat resulted in beating of Mr.Arjun Munda by Congress’ candidate Kalicharan Munda in that region. The Congress also snatched Lohardaga from the BJP where its candidate Sukhdev Bhagat defeated BJP’s Sameer Oraon. Ranchi was the only seat captured by the BJP whose candidate Sanjay Seth retained it for second time running against former Union Minister and Congress veteran Subodh Kant Sahay’s daughter Yashaswini Sahay.
In Kolhan, INDIA bloc made substantial gains winning two seats among which are Singhbhum where Ms.Koda lost to JMM’s Joba Manjhi and Jamshedpur where Bidyut Baran Mahto scored hat-trick for BJP over JMM’s Sameer Mohanty.
Santhal
It is believed that whoever wins Santhal region rules Jharkhand. Of these Godda, Dumka and Rajmahal constituencies, the BJP retained Godda while the other two went to JMM. Districts within Santhal-Pargana region are six: Deoghar, Godda, Sahebganj, Pakur, Dumka and Jamtara. In Godda JMM’s Vijay Hansdak got hat-trick but finished second in Rajmahal while the BJP’s Nishikant Dubey defeated Congress’ Pradeep Yadav. In Dumka JMM’s Sita Soren was beaten by BJP candidate Nalin Soren who is daughter-in-law of Shibu Soren who had joined BJP months before.
Other battles
RJD’s Mamta Bhuiyan could not defeat V.D.Ram of the BJPin Palamu seat. Chatra seat was won by Kalicharan Singh of BJP against KrishnandanTripathi. Similarly, Giridih, Koderma, Dhanbadand Hazaribaghare four seats that went into NDA kitty. ChandraPrakashChoudhary (All Jharkhand Students Union (AJSU)) outplayed Mathura Mahto (JMM) in Giridih whereas Annapurna Devi (BJP) won over Vinod Singh (Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) in Koderma respectively.Besides this, Dhanbad seat has been taken up by Dhullu Mahto from Congress’ Anupama Singh.The winning name for Hazaribagh was ManishJaiswal(BJP) against Jaiprakash Bhai Patel from Congress.
The results show that giving up trust among tribal population in Jharkhand has proved fatal to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Money laundering charges on former Chief Minister HemantSoren have backfired on the party; indeed these are expected to act as alarm bells for the saffron party that is due to face Assembly elections in Jharkhand later this year.
