Mapping Voting Behaviour of 2017 Assembly Election in Uttar Pradesh
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PAIDEUMA JOURNAL Issn No : 0090-5674 Mapping Voting Behaviour of 2017 Assembly Election in Uttar Pradesh Dr. Seema Sahdev Associate Professor, Kalindi College University of Delhi Abstract: Mapping the voting behaviour and voting turnout pattern of an area is of great significance for Electoral Geographer as it depict the level of political consciousness and development of that area. The present paper is an attempt to identify spatial pattern of support for major parties and also examine that how environmental issues shape voting pattern and voting behaviour in 2017 Assembly Election. The analysis of voting patterns and spatial strength of political parties also needs to be accompanied by study of policies, programme and promises offered by all major political parties in the fray and the issues of national and regional importance prevailing at that time. The BJP won a striking victory across all the regions of the state. The spatial spread of BJP’s votes become more even with the increase in overall party vote share. The important reason for BJP’s victory may be attributed to weakening of well based state level parties i.e. BSP and SP. The paper examine the momentous development instigated by the resurgence of BJP in the state and its massive victory in 2017 assembly election. Key Words: Electoral participation: Margin of Victory, Voter Turnout, party Performance, Voting Behavior, party Strength. Introduction: Since independence, politics in U.P has seen many ups and downs, experiencing four different phases including the congress regime, the coalition politics, regional party regime and the BJP regime. The congress continued to be the largest party and remained in power till the 1989 with the exception of 1977 election. The political landscape of the state has not been the same after 1989 or the post Babri Masjid – Ram Mandir movement when the BJP polarized the society. The presence of BJP in state politics may be noted during the period 1991 and 1997-2002, when it formed the government in the state. Since the early 1990s, the decline of the congress and since late 1990s, the decline of the BJP created space for BSP and SP to improve their performance. Babri Masjid-Ayodhya Mandir issue and mandal issue provided impetus to these state level parties to spread their political space in the state. Since 2002 till 2012 assembly election people shared faith in the larger backward class leadership and rejected the manifestation of both the national parties. The 2007 and 2012 assembly election brought a change in U.P politics as hung assembly, coalition politics prevailing since 1993 may came to an end. The BSP ruled the state from 2007 to 2012 when it allowed the inclusion of people belonging to other caste and political policy diverted Vol XII Issue XII 2019 798 http://www.paideumajournal.com PAIDEUMA JOURNAL Issn No : 0090-5674 from Bahujan samaj to Sarva samaj. But this experiment of social engineering did not work during 2012 election and S.P won the election with clear majority and also receive the over whelming support of Dalit’s. However, since then, there have been momentous development instigated by the resurgence of the BJP and its massive victory in the 2017 assembly elections. This development has completely altered the political dynamics in the state by virtually eroding the support base of two state level parties. The 2017 election was won convincingly by the BJP and this study documents the reasons for and events leading up to this outcome. Aims and Objectives: - In the background of the above research problem, the aims and objectives of the study are 1. To analyse the spatial pattern of voting turns out. 2. To examine the spatial pattern of party victories. 3. To assess the extent to which the party’s electoral support is regionally concentrated or uniformly spread. 4. To examine the factors which are responsible for rapidly increasing base of Bhartiya Janta Party. Data Base: This study is based on secondary data. The secondary sources of data on voting and elections include the Election Commission Report from the website. The secondary sources of socio-economic data are various publications of census of India. District and state level Gazetteers are consulted for historical background. The center for the study of developing society conducted a survey in U.P during 2017 Assembly elections and that data we have used for identifying the social bases of voting. Study Area: U.P one of the politically most important state of India, lies between the latitude of 23°52’ to 30⁰28’ North and longitude 77⁰04’to 84⁰38’ East. The state was bifurcated by transferring thirteen districts to form the state of Uttaranchal now known as Uttarakhand on 8 November 2000. The state is now divided into 71 districts under 18 divisions, 312 tahsils and 1.06 lakh villages administratively and 81 parliamentary and 403 assembly constituencies electorally. Of the total number of 403 seats, 85 seats are reserved for scheduled castes (fig 1). Vol XII Issue XII 2019 799 http://www.paideumajournal.com PAIDEUMA JOURNAL Issn No : 0090-5674 Structurally, it constitutes the part of the Indo-Gangetic plain that lies between peninsular India in the south and the Himalayan Mountain in the north. In terms of demography, Uttar Pradesh is the fifth largest and most populous state in the country accounting for 16.16 percent of India’s total population. As per the 2011 census, the literacy rate in the state is 69.72 percent, while still below the National average 74.04 percent. The female literacy rate is even lower at 59.26 percent and much below the male literacy rate of 79.24 percent. Only about 22.8 percent of the population in the state lies in urban area. About 80 percent of the U.P population comprises Hindu with Muslims accounting for 18 percent of the population. Caste and class form the two most important bases of the society in U.P. Approximately 23.6 percent of the state’s population belongs to the upper caste which are in a minority. These upper castes include the Brahmins, Rajput, Baniyas, Kayestha, Jat and Gujjars. Methodology and Techniques: The present study is based on areal structural and areal Ecological approach. The areal structural approach examined the spatial pattern and structure of voting choice as revealed by the aggregate data of the election result, which includes information regarding the number and percentage of the electorate who actually cast their votes and the votes polled by each party. And the patterns so identified are explained in relation to their total environmental context that is an ecological analysis. Vol XII Issue XII 2019 800 http://www.paideumajournal.com PAIDEUMA JOURNAL Issn No : 0090-5674 The spatial patterns of voter torn out are measured in terms of votes polled as a percentage of the total electorate. The spatial strength of a party’s electorate support is measured by the percentage of votes polled by each party to the total valid votes in each assembly constituency which is divided into five categories. The first category comprises less than 20 percent votes indicating very weak support. The second category comprises 20.01 to 30.00 percent of votes indicating weak support. The third category comprises 30.0 to 40.00 percent indicating moderate support. The fourth category comprises 40.01 to 50.00 percent votes indicating high support. Finally, the fifth category shows that the victory of political party is decisive which polls more than 50 percent of the valid votes. With this categorisation of party votes, comparative analysis of the strength of party is identified. Choropleth maps have been prepared by using Arc GIS 9.3 software to illustrate the spatial distribution of different levels of voting phenomena. Analysis of Voting Patterns: The assembly election of 2017, showed the different result. All the major parties had contested election with pre-poll alliance excluding Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), The Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) had made alliance with Apna Dal (ADAL), Suheldev Bharatiya Samaj Party (SBSP) and Samajwadi party with Indian National Congress. In 2017 assembly election voter turnout was 61.04 percent as compared to 59.5 percent in 2012 assembly election. The slight increase in turn out is carried almost exclusively driven by women, who outvoted men by more than 3 percent in this election. Only 10 constituencies recorded less than 50 percent voter turnout. The level of voter turnout was very high (more than 70 percent) in Saharanpur, Jyotiba phule Nagar and Lalitpur district. Thus 2017 assembly election witnesses an active voter participation resulting in a high level of turnout in most of the constituency with an even spatial distribution pattern (Fig 2). Vol XII Issue XII 2019 801 http://www.paideumajournal.com PAIDEUMA JOURNAL Issn No : 0090-5674 The seat share of a political party denotes its respective strength in the legislature and determines which party would form the government. The degree of success of a political party is taken as the proportion of seat won by it to the total number of seats contested. In the 2017 assembly election BJP won 312 out of 403 seats and thus won 77.41 percent of the assembly seats. BJP got 75 out of 85 reserved seats. The SP was the second largest party, winning 47 seats. The BSP got 19 seats whereas Congress and Independent claimed only 7 and 3 seats respectively. (Table 1.1) Vol XII Issue XII 2019 802 http://www.paideumajournal.com PAIDEUMA JOURNAL Issn No : 0090-5674 Table 1.1 UTTAR PRADESH: Seat won by different political parties in Assembly Election-2017 party No of seats Percentage of seat won share won National political parties BJP BSP 312 77.41 CPI 19 4.71 CPM 0 - INC 0 - 7 1.73 State political Parties RLD 1 0.24 SP 47 11.66 Register unrecognised political party ADAL NINSHAD 9 2.23 SBSP 1 0.24 4 0.99 Independent candidates 3 0.74 Total 403 100 Source: - Compiled from the Data of the State Election Commission, U.P The success attained by the BJP was most remarkable as it won 312 seats out of 384 it contested, signifying a degree of success of 81.25 percent.