BHOPAL: Both Congress and BJP are wary of repeating candidates who won by a margin of 5000 or less votes in the last assembly elections in
Madhya Pradesh. Five ministers of the
Shivraj Singh Chouhan government are in this “photo-finish club”.
The presence of anti-quota groups like Sawarn Samaj and SAPAKS in the fray this time is giving jitters to both the parties as they could particularly play spoilsport in seats which were won by wafer-thin margins.
“Leaders who won by a margin of 5,000 votes or less must opt out of the fray this time. It will be a multi-cornered contest and there are political players willing to ruin the game,” said a functionary.
Sources said that in four major regions where there are fewer SC or tribal voters, SAPAKS could spoil the game by cornering 1% to 2% votes. The Gwalior-Chambal region isn’t untouched by the change in equation. People in these areas have shown black flags to local leaders of both Congress and BJP. In Vindhyas, where the caste equation has shadowed the development agenda, leaders are trying to woo upper-caste voters or those who threaten to select NOTA to oppose the amendment in SC/ST Act. In the last polls, seven MLAs from Congress, BJP and BSP won by less than 1,000 votes. The narrowest margin was in Surkhi assembly seat of
Sagar district, where BJP MLA Parul Sahu inched past her Congress rival Govind Sing
Rajput by just 141 votes.
Sources in BJP and Congress said both parties plan to keep those who won very narrowly or lost badly in 2013 out of the fray in 2018.
