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March 7, 1998

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ELECTIONS '96

The Left parties' decline and fall in Orissa

The Left parties, particularly the Communist Party of India and the Communist Party of India-Marxist, suffered a major setback in Orissa in the just-concluded Lok Sabha elections.

All the four candidates of the two Left parties, including state CPI secretary Abani Baral and veteran CPI-M leader Shivaji Patnaik who contested the election, lost their deposit.

The state assembly is also now unrepresented by the Left parties as the Brajarajnagar assembly seat, held by veteran trade union leader Prasanna Panda for several years, has been bagged by the Congress in the by-election held along with the general polls in the state. The by-election was necessitated by Panda's death.

The CPI-M's debacle was greater as its candidate, former MP Shivaji Patnaik, who held the seat thrice in the past, polled only 17,611 votes, the lowest ever polled by any CPI-M or CPI candidate in a Lok Sabha election in the state.

Patnaik polled 332,005 votes in the 1989 Lok Sabha election. Although he retained the Bhubaneswar seat in 1991, the number of votes went down to 214,429. In the 1996 Lok Sabha election, Patnaik, however, lost the seat to the Congress, but polled 218,970 votes.

Besides the Bhubaneswar seat, the CPI-M contested the Berhampur seat. Party candidate Ali Kishore Patnaik finished a poor third in Berhampur polling 36,606 votes.

The election proved that the CPI-M vote bank has greatly reduced over the years.

The Left has been supported in past elections by a major party. In 1977, it was the Bharatiya Lok Dal, in 1989, the Janata Party, and in 1991 the Janata Dal, which helped the Left win their seats.

The CPI-M has polled less than two per cent of the votes in all the four Lok Sabha elections since 1977. It, however, registered more than two per cent votes in both the 1989 and 1991 Lok Sabha elections. But the vote share again dropped to 1.6 per cent in the last election.

The CPI's polling percentage over the years has also shown a declining trend. It secured a record 5.1 per cent in the 1962 Lok Sabha election, which dropped to 3.9 in the next election.

The CPI, which bagged one seat each in the 1952 and 1957 Lok Sabha elections, retained its position only in 1971 when it polled 4.3 per cent of votes. The party, however, failed to retain its traditional Jagatsinghpur seat in the 1977, 1980, and 1984 elections.

In 1989, CPI candidate Lok Nath Choudhary polled a record 408,057 votes in Jagatsinghpur. The party retained the seat in the next election, but its votes was reduced to 321,635.

The CPI contested all these elections with the support of the major non-Congress party in the state. In 1966, it contested the Jagatsinghpur seat on its own and lost the deposit.

In the last election, the party finished a poor third in Aska and Jagatsinghpur, and in the Brajarajnagar assembly seats; it forfeited its deposit in all three seats. While in Jagatsinghpur it polled a little over 90,000 votes in Aska, the CPI candidate secured only 41,400 votes.

The Left parties, which all along had a major electoral ally in the Janata Dal, now appear to find it difficult to retain its support base in the state with the split in the Janata Dal.

A major chunk of the Dal rank and file in almost all the districts, have joined the newly formed Biju Janata Dal.

The Janata Dal also suffered a major debacle in the state with all except one of its candidates losing their deposit while the BJD has emerged as a force in the new political arena, bagging nine of the 12 Lok Sabha seats it contested.

In the changed political scenario, the BJD, now the principal Opposition, having entered into a poll tie-up with the BJP in the state, the future of the Left parties seems uncertain.

UNI

Elections '98

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