1.2 Regional results

see separate article, Indian general elections, 2004-Regional Scenarios

1.3 Results by party

right Indian National Congress, Click for full picture right Bharatiya Janata Party, Click for full picture right Communist Party of India (Marxist), Click for full picture There are a maximum of 545 members of Parliament: 543 elected, and two may be nominated by the President to represent the Anglo-Indian community. Repolling was ordered in four constituencies due to irregularities. The results in the remaining constituencies were as follows (parties recognised by the Election Commission as national parties are in italics, and regional or state parties parties in Roman font):

• Congress and Allies: 217
  • Indian National Congress: 145
  • Rashtriya Janata Dal: 21
  • Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam: 16
  • Nationalist Congress Party: 9
  • Pattali Makkal Katchi: 6
  • Telangana Rashtra Samithi: 5
  • Jharkhand Mukti Morcha: 5
  • Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam: 4
  • Lok Jan Shakti Party : 3
  • People's Democratic Party: 1
  • Republican Party of India : 1
  • Muslim League: 1
• BJP and Allies: 185
  • Bharatiya Janata Party: 138
  • Shiv Sena: 12
  • Biju Janata Dal: 11
  • Shiromani Akali Dal: 8
  • Janata Dal (United): 7
  • Telugu Desam Party: 5
  • All India Trinamool Congress: 2
  • Nagaland People's Front : 1
  • Mizo National Front: 1
• Left Parties: 60
  • Communist Party of India - Marxist: 43
  • Communist Party of India: 10
  • Revolutionary Socialist Party: 3
  • All India Forward Bloc: 3
  • LDF-supported Independent: 1
• Other Parties: 78
  • Samajwadi Party: 36
  • Bahujan Samaj Party: 18
  • Janata Dal (Secular): 4
  • Rashtriya Lok Dal: 3
  • Asom Gana Parishad: 2
  • Jammu and Kashmir National Conference: 2
  • Indian Federal Democratic Party : 1
  • Loktantrik Jan Samta Party : 1
  • Kerala Congress: 1
  • All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen : 1
  • Bharatiya Navshakti Party : 1
  • National Loktantrik Party: 1
  • Sikkim Democratic Front : 1
  • Samajwadi Janata Party : 1
• Independents: 3

2 Organisation

The election dates for the parliamentary elections were:

• April 20 - 141 constituencies
• April 26 - 137 constituencies
• May 5 - 83 constituencies
• May 10 - 182 constituencies

Counting began simultaneously on 13 May. Over 370 million of the 675 million eligible citizens voted, with election violence claiming 48 lives, less than half the number killed during the 1999 election. The Indian elections were held in phases in order to maintain law and order. A few states considered sensitive areas required deployment of the armed forces. The average enrolment of voters in each constituency is 1.2 million, although the largest constituency has 3.1 million.

The Election Commission of India is responsible for deciding the dates and conducting elections according to constitutional provisions. The Election Commission employed more than a million electronic voting machines for these elections.

According to the magazine India Today, 115.62 billion rupees (approx USD 2.6 billion) were expected to have been spent in campaigning for the elections by all political parties combined. Most of the money was spent on the people involved in the election. The Election Commission limited poll expenses to Rs. 2.5 million (USD 57,000 approx.) per constituency. Thus, the actual spending is expected to have been approximately 10 times the limit. About 6.5 billion rupees (approx. USD 150 million) are estimated to have been spent on mobilising 150,000 vehicles. About a billion rupees are estimated to have been spent on helicopters and aircrafts.

3 Political background

Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee had recommended premature dissolution of the 13th Lok Sabha (in accordance with a provision of the Constitution) to pave the way for early elections apparently in view of the recent good showing of the BJP in the Assembly elections in four states. The two "major parties" in India are the BJP (led by Vajpayee) and the Congress (led by Sonia Gandhi).

4 Pre-poll alliances

In these elections the battle was, compared to the all the Lok Sabha elections of the 1990's, more of a head-to-head contest in the sense that there was no viable third front alternative. Largely the contest was between BJP and its allies on one hand and Congress and its allies on the other. The situation did, however, show large regional differences.

The BJP fought the elections as part of the NDA, although some of its seat-sharing agreements were made with strong regional parties outside of the NDA such as Telugu Desam Party in Andhra Pradesh and All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam in Tamil Nadu.

Ahead of the elections there was a process attempting to form a Congress-led national level joint opposition front. Finally an agreement could not be reached, but on regional level alliances between Congress and regional parties were made in several states. This was the first time that Congress contested with that type of alliances in a parliamentary election.

The left parties, most notably Communist Party of India (Marxist) and Communist Party of India, contested on their own in their strongholds West Bengal, Tripura and Kerala, confronting both Congress and NDA forces. In several other states, such as Punjab and Andhra Pradesh they took part in seat sharings with Congress. In Tamil Nadu they were part of the DMK-led Democratic Progressive Alliance .

Two major parties refused to go along with any of the two major parties, Bahujan Samaj Party and Samajwadi Party. Both are based in Uttar Pradesh, the largest state of India. Congress made several attempts to form alliances with them, but in vain. Many beleived that they would become the 'spoilers' that would rob Congress the electoral victory. The result was a four-cornered contest in UP, which didn't really benefit Congress but certainly not BJP either.

5 Forecast and campaigns

Most analysts believed the NDA would win the elections: this assessment was also supported by opinion polls. The economy had shown steady growth in the last few months and the disinvestment of government owned production units (continuation of India's liberalisation policies initiated in the early 1990s) had been on track. The Forex Reserves of India stood at more than USD 100 billion (7th largest in the world and a record for India). The service sector had also generated a lot of jobs. The party was supposed to have been riding on a wave of the so-called "feel good factor", typified by its promotional campaign " India Shining".

In the past, BJP has largely been seen as a hard-line Hindu party with close ties with the Hindu organisation the RSS. Over the years, the party has slightly distanced itself from its Hindutva policies. A change that is being questioned after the party's poor showing in the elections. These elections were marked by the campaign's emphasis on economic gains. From the last few elections, BJP had realised that its voter base had reached a ceiling and had concentrated on pre-poll rather than post-poll alliances. The foreign origin of Sonia Gandhi also constituted part of the NDA's campaign.

In contrast to NDA propaganda which had been high-profile and the source of much controversy and debate, Congress had a low profile campaign limited to regional media (in regional languages) instead of national media. The Congress Party was riding on slogans like "The Hand of Congress (the party's official symbol) is with the common man," indicating that it was banking on support from the vast majority of Indians and not so much on the upper middle class and the elite. According to their manifesto, Congress, if elected to power, would create 10 million new jobs, by employing more people in the government-owned companies and production units.

6 Analysis

Though pre-poll predictons were for an overwhelming majority for the BJP, the exit polls (immediately after the elections and before the counting began) predicted a hung parliament. However, even the exit polls could only indicate the general trend and nowhere close to the final figures. There is also the general perception that as soon as the BJP started realising that events might not proceed entirely in its favour, it changed the focus of its campaign from India Shining to issues of stability.

The reverses in the pre-poll predictions are ascribed to various reasons depending on the point of view.

• People were more concerned about issues of their immediate environment such as water scarcity, drought, etc., rather than on national issues.
• The anti-incumbency factor was at work for the BJP allies.
• The BJP government had concentrated more on the market and economic reforms that benefitted the urban people at the expense of the rural poor and the farmers
• The " India Shining" campaign went over the top concentrating on the above mentioned reforms and did not highlight on the reforms at the rural level.
• People were concerned with communal issues after the Gujarat riots and thus their mandate for a secular government.
• Congress was more inclusive and formed good pre-poll alliances.
• Before the winning the Assembly elections in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, and Rajasthan BJP ruled only in three states ( Goa, Gujarat, and Jharkhand) and had lost most state elections to Congress. After the winning in the three states BJP had a false sense of popularity and elections were called early.

7 Impact

The rout of the ruling parties in the states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala in the general elections led to calls for the dissolution of the governments of these states.

The stock market ( Bombay Stock Exchange) fell in the week prior to the announcement of the results due to fears of an unstable coalition. As soon as counting began, however, it became clear that the Congress coalition was headed for a sizeable lead over the NDA and the market surged, only to crash the following day when the left parties, whose support would be required for government formation, announced that it was their intention to do away with the disinvestment ministry. Following this, Manmohan Singh, the current Prime Minister and the prime architect of the economic liberalization of the early 1990s, hurried to reassure investors that the new government would strive to create a business-friendly climate.

8 Events

• May 13 - The Congress and allies win a plurality of seats in the Lok Sabha (219 seats against 188 for the BJP).
• May 13 - Counting of votes in the parliamentary elections begins.
• May 11 - Congress wins the Assembly elections in Andhra Pradesh by 2/3 majority.
• May 10 - The fourth and final phase of elections comes to an end. Results will come out for 542 of the 543 parliament seats with elections to be held again in Chhapra .
• May 5 - Third phase of polling comes to an end with the ruling coalition government gaining seats according to exit polls but still off the victory target. Reports of booth capturing in Chhapra capture headlines.
• April 26 - Second phase of elections sees 55-60% polling. This is the final phase for assembly elections. Polling covers 136 parliamentary constituencies in 11 states. The share market starts to crash as it becomes evident that the NDA government may find it hard to come back to power -- raising doubts about the continuation of economic reforms initiated by the NDA government.
• April 22 - Tripura, where polling was delayed because of a local holiday, votes for its two MPs. A turnout of close to 60% is reported, despite calls for absention made by separatist militants.
• April 20 - The first phase of the vote is held, with average turnouts of between 50% and 55%. Voting is reported as brisk, and the day unfolds relatively smoothly, albeit with some glitches reported with the electronic voting machines. Isolated violent incidents take place in Kashmir, Jammu, Manipur, and Jharkhand.
• April 8 - The NDA's top leaders meet in New Delhi to adopt its manifesto for the elections, "Agenda for Development and Good Governance".
• April 7 - Ram Jethmalani says he will contest the elections against Prime Minister Vajpayee as an independent candidate from Lucknow. He claims he will be supported by the Congress and some other parties.
• April 6 - The BJP and the AIADMK tell the Election Commission that they will not stop raising the issue of the foreign origin of Congress president Sonia Gandhi.
• April 4 - A FIR is lodged against external affairs minister Yashwant Sinha for alleged violation of election code of conduct during a poll meeting in Ranchi. Besides Sinha, FIRs were lodged against three other BJP leaders who participated in the meeting.

9 See also

• Indian general elections 1951-1971
• Indian general elections 1977-1999

10 External links

• Election Commission of India
• Parliament of India
• Indian National Congress
• BJP
• Interactive map at rediff.com
• Elections 2004 - Poll Graphics from The Hindu
• Indian Electronic Voting Machines Compared With Diebold

Elections in India 2004 in politics

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