Non-aligned parties suffer as LS polls become NDA vs INDIA bloc

New Delhi: As the 2024 general elections became a fight between the NDA and the INDIA bloc with coalition politics regaining significance, the results also showed a sharp decline in the fortune of non-aligned parties.

Parties like the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in Uttar Pradesh, Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) in Telangana, Biju Janata Dal in Odisha and YSR Congress Party in Andhra Pradesh, which were not a part of either of the two blocs, suffered major setbacks.

The Bahujan Samaj Party fielded 488 candidates across the country, the highest number of candidates to be fielded by a party, even surpassing the BJP’s 441 candidates. However, it drew a blank and got around 2.05 per cent votes.

In 2019, the BSP won 10 seats, with a vote share of 3.62 per cent.

In Odisha, Biju Janata Dal (BJD) was limited to only one seat in Lok Sabha. The party had 12 MPs in Odisha in 2019 out of the total 21 seats. Its vote share in 2024 was 1.44 per cent, slightly down from the 1.66 per cent vote share it had in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

In Andhra Pradesh, where the BJP allied with the Telugu Desam Party and Jana Sena, the YSR Congress Party was leading on four seats, significantly down from 22 seats in the 2019 polls. It polled around 2.06 percent, down from the 2.53 per cent vote share it had last time.

In neighbouring Telangana, Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) was not leading even on a single seat. The party, which came to power in the state after spearheading the agitation for its formation, had won nine seats in Lok Sabha in 2019, with a vote share of 1.25 per cent. This time, the vote share of the BRS was 0.57 percent.

The BJP emerged as the single largest party in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, but could not cross the majority mark.

After 12 hours of counting of votes that began at 8 am, the Bharatiya Janata Party won or was ahead in 240 seats to emerge as the single largest party, a far cry from the 303 it had won last time in the 543-member Lok Sabha to mark the return of coalition politics.

The Congress, which is part of the opposition INDIA alliance, was leading or winning 99 seats compared to 52 it won in 2019 eating into BJP’s share in Rajasthan and Haryana. The INDIA bloc won or was ahead in over 200 seats.