In the Lok Sabha election battle, most exit polls on five seats in Uttarakhand may have left the Congress empty-handed, but the Congress is hopeful of an upset. The way more than 30 percent of the voters in the state have kept faith in the Congress in every election and the decrease in voting in the Lok Sabha elections this time, the party is considering it as a better result for itself. The party’s strategists believe that a large part of the votes of minorities, Scheduled Castes and Other Backward Castes have come in the party’s kitty. The announcement of election results on June 4 is going to prove auspicious for the party. Congress has been relying on the minority and Scheduled Caste vote bank in the state for a long time. In all the Lok Sabha elections or assembly elections so far, Congress has proved its hold on a large part of the voters.
It is a different matter that in the last four Lok Sabha elections in the state, the biggest setback to the Congress in terms of votes was in the year 2019. In the 2004 elections, Congress got 38.31 percent votes, in 2009 it got 43.13 percent votes, in 2014 it got 34.40 percent votes and in 2019 it got 31.73 percent votes. In all these vote percentages, the number of votes of minorities, especially Muslims and Scheduled Castes is considered to be quite good. The alliance of minority community, especially Muslims, Scheduled Castes and Other Backward Castes has been playing a big role in deciding the victory or defeat of candidates on Haridwar and Nainital-Udham Singh Nagar Lok Sabha seats. There is a good number of Muslim voters on both these seats. The voting graph in the state has fallen, but there has been relatively more voting in minority dominated assembly constituencies. This behavior of the voters has also given new strength to the confidence of Congress.
Election results will be in favor of Congress
Karan Mahara Similarly, in the Garhwal parliamentary seat, there are a good number of Muslim voters in Ramnagar and Kotdwar. The number of Scheduled Castes is also considered to be around 22 percent. Based on the minority and caste equations, Congress is confident that it will perform well in the Garhwal parliamentary seat. Due to this confidence, Congress national general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra was called to campaign in Roorkee in Ramnagar and Haridwar under the Garhwal seat. For this reason, Congress is hoping to get better election results especially in Haridwar and Garhwal seats. State Congress President Karan Mahara said that the election results on June 4 will be in Congress’s favor. The party is going to perform better.