2. Uttar Pradesh: This is the second of the two shocks of this election, along with West Bengal. I was never expecting Mayawati to do as well as Mulayam did in 2004, but I was definitely not expecting the Congress to emerge as a close third to the two regional parties. What I think worked for the Congress was, along with the campaigning, the selection of the right candidates. The Congress has shown promise and I hope it does not disappoint.
3. Maharashtra: Maharashtra this time has defied logic and voted for the Congress-NCP alliance despite what was mostly a non-performing state Government. The effect of the MNS factor will become clearer in a few days, but for the Congress, Maharashtra has been the big story this election along with Uttar Pradesh.
4. Tamil Nadu: Throughout the election, I told everyone that the DMK-Congress alliance was arithmetically superior to the AIADMK-PMK-MDMK-Left. Just yesterday, I told a friend that I expected DMK-Congress to get at least over half the seats, and I am proud to say that I got it right.
5. Bihar: Lalu is now definitely facing irrelevance and I would like Nitish to take the risk now of allying with the Congress since the BJP is surely incapable of providing him a national platform. But the defeat of Lalu-Paswan has been complete and the Congress has shown its relevance even in Bihar.
4 comments:
1. Congress is the second largest part in UP right now, if I'm not wrong.
2. Congress hasn't become relevant in Bihar. It won just two seats. But yes, RJD+LJP _has_ faded in significance.
@ Ankur,
I checked up on the vote shares of the parties in Bihar (in many seats, the Congress is a close third) and I also heard that the Congress finished runners up in as many as 12 of the seats. So, I guess they have definitely become relevant now that Lalu faces, if I may say so, extinction.
Yes, Congress is definitely second in UP in terms of seats. Though I'm still waiting for the vote shares to come out to see if its come second in vote share too.
OK, I was going primarily by the number of seats won and not vote share. If your stats are true, then Congress has done really well in Bihar!
I just read that the Congress has increased its vote share from 4.49% in 2004 to 11% this time in Bihar. That means the Congress is almost as strong as BJP in Bihar and 4% higher than the LJP. That is some awesome performance.
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