NEW DELHI: Bhopal, a BJP stronghold, gears up for an electoral battle between Alok Sharma and Arun Shrivastav, amid BJP’s bid to continue dominance.
Bhopal is a political powerhouse renowned for its significant influence in Indian politics and a fortress of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). In Bhopal, the BJP has never lost an election since 1989 and is looking to continue its winning streak in 2024 as well.
This time, Bhopal will witness the electoral contest between the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Alok Sharma and Congress’s Arun Shrivastav vying for the seat. Although the mood in Bhopal is already in favour of Alok Sharma, despite losing the previous assembly election.
Alok Sharma has a strong presence on the ground and connects with the people easily in comparison to the Congress candidate Arun Shrivastav. Shrivastav’s name does not hold any value in people’ mind in Bhopal. Political pundits say that Congress also knows the fact that Shrisvastav hardly has any ground presence, despite the fact that they have fielded him. Even their stalwart leader, Digvijaya Singh, has failed to create any impact on this seat. He faces defeat against the BJP’s Sadhvi Pragya Thakur by a margin of 3,64,822.
However, Singh was the only candidate who got more than 5 lakh votes in Bhopal. Way back in 1984, K.N. Pradhan of Congress last won this seat; since then, Congress has never won this seat. On the other hand, the BJP is looking to continue its winning streak in Bopal.
Alok Sharma of the BJP told The Sunday Guardian that the whole of Bhopal will vote for the BJP and will continue the winning streak in Bhopal. He said, “We are projecting Modi’s guarantee, beneficiaries here are telling us that they got various benefits from the government, such as food subsidies and houses, and the public itself is saying, ‘Phir Ek Bar Modi Sarkar’. We will register victory in all 29 Lok Sabha seats in Madhya Pradesh.”
The Bhopal Lok Sabha seat is one of the 29 parliamentary seats in Madhya Pradesh, comprising eight Assembly segments: Berasia, Bhopal Uttar, Narela, Bhopal Dakshin-Paschim, Bhopal Madhya, Govindpura, Huzur, and Sehore. Six out of eight assemblies voted for the BJP in 2019, and a similar result stands in the 2023 assembly election, as the BJP won six seats while Congress managed to bag the remaining two seats.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP’s Sadhvi Pragya Thakur won with a substantial margin of 3,64,822 votes. However, this time the incumbent MP from Bhopal has been denied a ticket by the BJP.
Bhopal reflects a diverse demographic and remains a crucial constituency of Madhya Pradesh. constituency has a total of 21,080,31 voters as of the 2019 election. SC and ST voters at the Bhopal parliament seat are approximately 320,421 and 61,133, which is around 15.2% and 2.9%, respectively, as per the 2011 Census. Muslim voters at the
Bhopal parliament seat are approximately 414,894, which is around 19.7% as per voter list analysis.
The high-profile seat of Bhopal is slated to go on poll in the third phase, i.e., on May 7, 2024.