BJP will get Only 5 seats in UP if Bua, Bhatija join hands with Rahul Gandhi

By FnF Correspondent | PUBLISHED: 23, Jan 2019, 19:30 pm IST | UPDATED: 23, Jan 2019, 19:32 pm IST

Delhi: The Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) have committed a big blunder by excluding the Congress from its pre-poll alliance in Uttar Pradesh for the Lok Sabha polls, show results of the Mood of the Nation poll conducted by India Today-Karvy Insights.

The poll shows that that if the SP, BSP, Congress, Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) and others fought together as a unit against the BJP, it would have inflicted a massive blow to the BJP.

From a paltry five seats in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the seat tally of these parties could have increased to 75 this time, if they were fighting as a single unit, the Mood of the Nation poll shows.

A total of 2,478 people were polled in Uttar Pradesh for this survey. Mood of the Nation is one of the biggest surveys conducted in the country to capture the nation's political pulse.

Findings of Mood of the Nation poll for UP

So, what could have happen if the SP, BSP, Congress and other smaller opposition parties join hands and fight the Lok Sabha election collectively against the Bharatiya Janata Party? What is the mood of the people in Uttar Pradesh, a state that sends 80 MPs to the Lok Sabha?

The BJP and its ally Apna Dal won 73 of the 80 seats in UP in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. Their combined vote share was 43.3 per cent.

As per the present mood of the voters in Uttar Pradesh, as captured by the India Today-Karvy Insights Mood of the Nation poll, the seats that the BJP-Apna Dal are likely to win this time will tumble from 73 to 5 - a fall of 93 per cent. In terms of vote share, the BSP-Apna Dal's share will fall from 43.3 per cent in 2014 to 36 per cent this time.

While the SP-BSP combine may have ditched the Congress to form a pre-poll alliance in Uttar Pradesh for the Lok Sabha election, political dynamics often change in an election year.

For instance, despite the SP-BSP alliance, senior Congress leaders have given ample signs to suggest that there is no last word on this yet.

The day when the SP-BSP alliance was announced, former Union minister P Chidambaram, who was in Varanasi, said it's possible that things may still change (on alliance formation). He said the SP-BSP alliance is not the last word.

On Tuesday, speaking to India Today TV on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, senior Congress leader and Madhya Pradesh CM Kamal Nath reiterated Chidambaram's comment.

With less than three months to the Lok Sabha polls, it remains interesting to see what changes take place in the political landscape in the country in general and Uttar Pradesh in particular.