Triangular contest awaits Ramgarh assembly seat

ALWAR: Polling in Alwar’s Ramgarh assembly segment scheduled on January 28, promises high-powered triangular contest. The elections were cancelled after the death of BSP candidate Laxman Singh on November 29. Being the last elections before the Lok Sabha polls in April-May 2019, sending a strong political message through the results has got central leadership of all parties thinking.

Both the main parties have reposed their faith on the same candidates as decided earlier — Sophia Khan (Congress) and Sukhwant Singh (BJP), while the BSP has fielded former Congress leader Natwar Singh’s son Jagat Singh, making the otherwise two-way contest a triangular one.

The formation of a Congress government in the state has forced all the contesting parties to change their winning strategy.

The Congress, which has 99 seats of out 199 in the assembly, would leave no stone unturned to claim this seat. Other than relying on the Muslim Meo votes, the party is also expecting a sharp vertical divide in the Hindu vote share, between the BSP and the BJP candidates.

Upbeat over winning two seats in Alwar’s Tijara and Kishangarh Bas by defeating the stalwarts of Congress and the BJP — A A Khan and Ramhet Yadav respectively, BSP candidate Jagat Singh has invited party chief Mayawati to hold a public rally in the constituency. BSP has won six seats in Rajasthan, and is hoping to add another MLA in its tally by drawing support from its SC voters and intruding into strong Muslim voters.

For BJP, it is the last electoral chance to instil confidence in its party workers before the Lok Sabha polls. Senior leaders, including former CM Vasundhara Raje, are likely to hold a public address in the favour of BJP candidate.

Election in Alwar has been contested on communal and cast lines. It has always thrown a surprise for the main political party.

In the recently concluded Vidhan Sabha polls, of the 10 seats, four were snatched by the Congress, while two each by the BJP, BSP and Independents.

Experts say that triangular contest has always favoured the Congress candidate and this time too, when Congress is in the power, it has an edge. Since 1952, for six times, the legislative assembly polls saw triangular contest. The Congress won four of those times.

The constituency has total of 2,34,647 voters, including 1,10,264 female voters. The caste-wise bifurcation says that Meo constitute the largest vote share of 58,000 followed by SC with 45,000 voters, Rajputs with 40,000 voters, Brahmins with 18,000, Sainis with 15,000 followed by 20,000 each for Jats and Gujjars.