Union Civil Aviation Minister and defector Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Jyotiraditya Scindia visited Gwalior in poll-bound Madhya Pradesh on Wednesday to meet party workers and discuss the upcoming Assembly elections. The assembly elections for the 230-member constituency in Madhya Pradesh will be held on November 17, and counting of votes will take place on December 3.
In Gwalior, Scindia told reporters: “Meri soch Congressiyon ki nahi hai, meri soch hai ki humein apne kaam mein dhyaan dena chahiye…” (My thoughts are not like Congress, my thoughts are that we need to focus on our work)
The statement is similar to his quitting the Congress, leading to the demise of Kamal Nath’s government.
The polls are a litmus test for Scindia, the scion of the erstwhile Gwalior kingdom, whose defection to the BJP brought it to power in 2020 but has led to bad blood between his loyalists who followed him into the party and the old guard.
Scindia’s visit to Gwalior comes as BJP faces headwinds in the Chambal-Gwalior region. The big push from the BJP to change its fortunes in the region, which had defeated it in the last assembly elections in Madhya Pradesh, seems to be facing some headwinds as regional factors take precedence and the Congress’s tone for change is the story of the ruling party. planks of development and well-being.
In several constituencies of the Chambal-Gwalior region, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been largely unqualified in praising his stewardship of the country, but many of the same voters are also talking about the need for ‘badlav’ (change) in the state, expressing mixed views on the situation . the Prime Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan-led government and raised a litany of complaints.
Issues such as price hike, unemployment, bureaucratic apathy, corruption and stray cattle are mentioned by a cross-section of voters in their criticism of the government.
The name ‘Scindia’ has some value in this belt, but it is also criticized.
Several voters feel that the BJP can make some gains in the region if he is also included in the Assembly elections as this will give rise to the perception that the party is eyeing him as a prime ministerial candidate.
Scindia was seen as a key factor in the Congress’s big victory in the region in 2018 and the BJP will be hoping that the presence of the ‘maharaj’ in its ranks will turn things around in the November 17 elections.
However, with the elections just a month away, a sizeable section of voters remain silent about their preferences in .na and Gwalior districts, part of the Chambal-Gwalior region, which accounts for 34 seats in the 230-member state assembly .
The Congress had swept the region in 2018, winning 27 of its constituencies.
.na and Gwalior districts together account for 12 seats, and the Congress had won 11 in the 2018 Assembly elections. However, the ruling party’s tally increased to three after the 2020 polls in the state after 25 MLAs, of which most were loyal to the then Congress leader and current Union Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia, resigned and joined the BJP.
(With input from the agency)
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Updated: Oct 18, 2023 2:34 PM IST
