Madhya Pradesh Election Result 2023 Highlights: Landslide victory for BJP with 163 seats; another CM tenure for Shivraj Singh Chouhan?

The Bharatiya Janata Party's decision to field 14 candidates above the age of 70, with the oldest being 80, in the Madhya Pradesh Assembly polls paid off as 11 of them won.

The BJP retained power in the state by winning 163 seats in the 230-member Assembly, relegating the Congress to a distant second with just 66 seats, down from the 114 the grand old party had got in the 2018 edition.

Nagendra Singh Nagod (80), a former state minister, won from Nagod in Satna district, while Nagendra Singh (79) emerged victorious from Gurh in Rewa district.

Both Nagod and Singh, sitting MLAs, had expressed unwillingness to fight elections around five months ago, said Jairam Shukla, a political observer and former editor of the monthly magazine 'Charavathi' brought out by Pandit Deendayal Vichar Prakashan in MP.

Jayant Malaiya (76) from Damoh, Jagannath Singh Raghuvanshi (75) from Chanderi in Ashok Nagar district, Sitasharan Sharma (73) from Hoshangabad in Narmadapuram, Bisahulal Singh (73) from Anuppur seat, also won.

The other veterans from the BJP who made it to the Assembly in the 2023 polls are Hajarilal Dangi (72) from Khilchipur in Rajgarh district, Premshankar Verma (72) from Seoni-Malwa in Narmadapuram, Jaisingh Maravi (71) from Jaitpur in Shahdol district, Gopal Bhargava (71) from Rehli in Sagar district and Ajay Vishnoi (71) from Patan in Jabalpu.

However, Durgalal Vijay (71) from Sheopur seat, Gauri Shankar Bisen (71) from Balaghat and Maya Singh (73) from Gwalior East lost.

In 2016, Sartaj Singh (then 76) was eased out of the Shivraj Singh Chouhan cabinet reportedly over age. He was denied a ticket in the 2018 assembly polls when he was 78. Singh quit the BJP and fought unsuccessfully on a Congress ticket from the Hoshangabad seat.

Similarly, Kusum Mahdele (80 now), a minister at the time, was also not given a ticket for the 2018 polls.

(PTI report)

Amid the bipolar battle between BJP and Congress in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan, tribal parties may have won only five seats, but their influence appears writ large in at least 24 seats, including the constituency of Niwas where Union Minister Faggan Singh Kulaste lost to the Congress.

The parties stood second in four of the 24 constituencies. In the rest, they polled more votes than the victory margin of either the Congress or the BJP. The BJP took home 12 of these seats and the Congress won eight.

Read full story.

Although he was not among the Union ministers who were fielded in the Madhya Pradesh polls, Jyotiraditya Scindia’s crucial responsibility and role in the BJP’s plans were clear from the onset of the campaigning in the state. The 52-year-old ‘Maharaja of Gwalior’ was entrusted the responsibility of his home turf, the Gwalior-Chambal region, comprising 34 seats. He delivered 18 to the BJP on Sunday, up from 7 in 2018.

Scindia was seated besides Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan at the latter’s house for the counting of results, along with fellow Union Minister Narendra Singh Tomar. The day ended with Scindia and Chouhan feeding each other laddoos. Tomar also had reason to celebrate, winning a tough contest in Dimani by a margin of 24,000 votes.

Read more.

A total of 27 women have been elected to the Madhya Pradesh Assembly, comprising 21 from the Bharatiya Janata Party, which emphatically retained power in the state, and six from the Congress.

The BJP's Krishna Gaur, the daughter-in-law of former chief minister Babulal Gaur, won by the widest margin among women. She defeated Congress' Ravindra Sahu by 1.06 lakh votes in Govindpura.

Malini Gaud, also from the BJP, won from Indore-4 seat by a margin of over 69,000 votes.

The saffron party's Priyanka Meena, who at 31 is also the youngest MLA, pulled off a giant killing act by defeating Lakshman Singh, brother of Congress veteran Digvijaya Singh, from Chachoura by a margin of more than 61,000 votes.

Lakshman Singh has been a Lok Sabha MP five times as well as a three-time MLA.

Other women who have made it to the Assembly after winning the polls on BJP tickets are Usha Thakur (Mhow) and Meena Singh (Manpur), both of whom were ministers, as well as MP Riti Pathak (Sidhi), former minister Archana Chitnis (Burhanpur) and former Rajya Sabha member Sampatiya Uikey (Mandla).

Manju Dadu (Nepanagar), Gangabai Uikey (Ghodadongari), Pratima Bagri (Raigaon), Radha Singh (Chitrangi), Neena Verma (Dhar), Nirmala Bhuria (Petlawad), Kanchan Tanve (Khandwa), Chhaya More (Pandhana),Gayatri Raje Puar (Dewas), Sarla Brijendra Rawat (Sabalgarh), Lalita Yadav (Chhatarpur) and Uma Khatik (Hatta) too won the polls on BJP tickets.

For the Congress, Anubha Munjare defeated minister Gaurishankar Bisen from Balaghat.

Others from the opposition party who were victorious are Sena Patel (Jobat), Nirmala Sapre (Bina), Chanda Singh Gaur (Khargapur), Sadhvi Ramsiya Bharti (Malhera) and Jhuma Solanki (Bhikangaon). (PTI)

In Madhya Pradesh, the Uttar Pradesh-based Samajwadi Party, a member of the Opposition INDIA bloc, had entered the fray with plenty of fanfare. But Sunday’s results spelled a disappointing outcome for the party, which failed to win any seat and registered less than 1% of the vote share in 55 of the 71 seats it contested.

While the Congress’s defeat in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan has diminished its bargaining power in the much anticipated seat-sharing negotiations with its INDIA partners for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the row between the SP and the Congress over an alliance for these state polls appears to have had little impact on the results.

Writes Anjishnu Das.

The BJP's impressive performance in politically crucial Malwa-Nimar and Gwalior-Chambal regions is one of the key factors behind the saffron party's resounding victory in Madhya Pradesh elections.

The BJP on Sunday cruised to a two-thirds majority in the MP assembly, winning 163 of the 230 seats, restricting the Congress to just 66.

The saffron party won 48 of the total 66 segments in the Malwa-Nimar region spread across 15 districts, a gain of 20 seats compared to 2018, decimating the Congress' tally to 17. Sailana segment in Ratlam district is won by Bharat Adivasi Party, a new entrant in the state politics.

In the 2018 assembly elections, Malwa-Nimar and Gwalior Chambal belts had hugely favoured Congress, which won 114 seats in the state at that time to grab power.

(PTI report)

The Bharatiya Janata Party managed to win more than half of the 34 seats in the Gwalior-Chambal region of Madhya Pradesh in the 2023 Assembly polls, but several of those who had joined the party in 2020 along with Union minister Jyotiraditya Scindia after revolting against the Congress bit the dust.

A revolt by 22 MLAs had led to the collapse of the Kamal Nath-led Congress government in March 2020. They along with Scindia later joined the BJP, which came back to power at the time.

In the 2023 polls, results of which were declared on Sunday, the BJP won 18 out of 34 seats in the Gwalior Chambal region, considered a stronghold of Scindia, while the Congress had to be content with 16 wins.

Among the Congress-turned-BJP leaders who lost on Sunday were:

• Imarti Devi from Dabra

• Raghuraj Singh Kansana from Morena

• Jajpal Singh Jaggi from Ashok Nagar

• Rajvardhan Singh Prem Singh Dattigaon from Badnawar

• tate minister Suresh Dhakad Ranthkheda from Pohari

• Mahendra Sisodia from Bamori

Those who won comprised:

•  Pradhuman Singh Tomar from Gwalior

• Govind Singh Rajput from Surkhi

• Dr Prabhuram Choudhary from Sanchi

• Tulsiram Silawat from Sanwer

• Brijendra Singh Yadav from Mungaoli

• Manoj Choudhary from Hatpipliya

• Mohan Singh Rathore from Bhitarwar

(PTI report)

Before the results came in on Sunday, the Congress Madhya Pradesh chief walked into the ‘war room’ at the party headquarters here to slogans of ‘Jai Jai Kamal Nath’, and to billboards plastered with congratulatory messages for him.

By the end of the day, everyone was wondering whether Kamal Nath would see a repeat of this.

BJP leader Ramesh Mendola won by the highest victory margin of 1,07,047 votes from Inodre-2 seat in the Madhya Pradesh assembly polls, while party candidate Arun Bhimawad bagged Shajapur seat by the lowest margin of just 28 votes.

MP Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and BJP's woman legislator Krishna Gaur also registered victory margins of more than one lakh votes.

• In Indore-2 seat, Mendola polled 1,69,071 votes as he defeated Congress' Chintu Choukse, who secured 62,024 votes.
• Krishna Gaur won from Govindpura seat by a margin of 1,06,668 votes defeating Congress' Ravindra Sahu.
• CM Chouhan won his traditional Budhni seat for the sixth time by a record margin of 1,04,974 votes defeating Congress candidate Vikram Mastal Sharma.
• BJP's Rameshwar Sharma, who won from his traditional Huzur seat, registered a victory margin of 97,910 votes.
• Senior BJP leader Gopal Bhargava (71) emerged victorious from his pocket-borough Rehli seat for the ninth time in a row by a margin of 72,800 votes, despite having the reputation of not campaigning during elections.
• The saffron party's woman leader, Malini Gaud, registered a victory margin of 69,837 votes from her traditional Indore-4 seat, which was earlier won by her husband and former minister late Lakshman Singh Gaud.
• BJP's Dr Chintamani Malviya won from Alot seat by a margin of 68,884 votes.
• In Shajapur seat, BJP's Arun Bhimavad scraped through by a thin margin of just 28 votes.
• Bhimawad secured 98,960 votes as he defeated Congress' Hukum Singh Karada, who polled 98,932 votes.
• In Mahidpur seat of Ujjain district, Congress' Dinesh Jain defeated BJP's Bahadur Singh Chouhan by a margin of 290 votes.
• BJP's Kalusingh Thakur won from Dharampuri seat in Dhar district by defeating Congress' Panchilal Meda by a margin of 356 votes.
• Narayan Patel of the BJP bagged Mandhata seat in Khandwa district by a margin of 589 votes.
• In Timarni seat (Harda district), Congress' Abhijeet Shah won by a margin of 950 votes.
• BJP's Rajesh Kumar Verma bagged Gunnaur seat in Panna district by a margin of 1,160 votes, while party leader Vijay Pal Singh won from Sohagpur in Hoshangabad district by a margin of 1,762 votes. 

(PTI report)

Madhya Pradesh Congress chief Kamal Nath met Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who is likely looking at a record fifth term as Chief Minister, in Bhopal today.

Yesterday, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) retained power in Madhya Pradesh, defeating anti-incumbency charge.

VIDEO | Madhya Pradesh elections 2023: Congress leader Kamal Nath met CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan in Bhopal earlier today.

(Source: Third Party)#AssemblyElectionsWithPTI #MadhyaPradeshElection2023 pic.twitter.com/T3pCNcnEIN

— Press Trust of India (@PTI_News) December 4, 2023

Former chief minister Kamal Nath said the party would introspect “why we couldn’t connect with the voters”, while veteran Congress leader Digvijaya Singh, also a former CM, behaved in a stoic manner leaving the party headquarters in Bhopal without responding to the reporters’ queries on Sunday, after the party suffered a massive defeat at the hands of the BJP.

Digvijaya had walked the length and breadth of the state. Kamal Nath, too, had undertaken a whirlwind tour of the state, especially the BJP strongholds.

“Kamal Nath was unable to energise the cadres the way Amit Shah could. The BJP announced its candidates much before we did and we could not grapple with the rebellions. Many of our workers joined other parties and damaged our prospects,” said another Congress leader from Bhopal.

“Our organisation structure was missing in many places. It is difficult to build it from scratch at the last hour. The BJP has more workers and money; they launched a massive public outreach programme… We had scarce resources,” said a Congress worker from the Bundelkhand region.

Anand Mohan J reports

For the Mahakoshal region of Madhya Pradesh, which the Congress had wrested from the BJP in the 2018 polls, the eventual 2023 election winners had deployed Union MoS for Food Processing Prahlad Patel to handle the campaign.

Not only did Patel have to bear the responsibility of breaching Congress strongholds in the critical region, he was also saddled with the burden of delivering Narsinghpur, where his brother Jalam Patel was said to be on a sticky wicket.

Going by the poll results Sunday, the BJP got an upper hand in as many as 16 seats won by the Congress in 2018 in Mahakoshal.

In an interview with The Indian Express, Prahlad Patel spoke about the factors that delivered the BJP victory in Madhya Pradesh.

Read here

After the BJP recorded an emphatic win in Madhya Pradesh on Sunday, enthusiastic party workers gathered outside the residence of state BJP chief V D Sharma, lifted him on their shoulders and carried him to his home. This was a victory march for Sharma, who had been at the receiving end for months after several party leaders jumped ship to Congress.

As the celebrations continued, Sharma waved a placard of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and senior party leader Amit Shah. He then proceeded to explain what went behind the BJP victory – how the party clawed back in an election that the Congress thought was theirs to win.

Sharma told The Indian Express, “40 lakh booth-level workers followed Amit Shah’s strategy. This is the result of that. Amit Shah ji had given the task of getting 51 per cent vote share in each booth in the state. Our workers tirelessly worked at 64,523 booths in the state and helped us reach that target.”

Read Anand Mohan J's report here

The BJP’S win in three of the four states for which results were declared on Sunday stood out for another fact – the party did not project a chief minister face in any, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan or Chhattisgarh.

But that did not stop the BJP’s march. Neither did the fact that in all the three states, the Congress had powerful regional satraps on its side, which on paper gave it an advantage as people knew exactly whom they were voting for.

In the BJP’s corner there was essentially only Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which the party sometimes euphemistically framed as a vote for the “lotus” or the party. At other times, it referred to a rather nebulous concept called collective leadership, which roughly meant the 18 MPs – including Union ministers – fielded by the BJP in the three states.

Coming months after the BJP’s Karnataka loss, blamed on the party’s marginalisation of its biggest state leader B S Yediyurappa, the Sunday results put the central leadership back in control, a position to its liking.

At the same time, the party might find it difficult to ignore the claims of either Shivraj Singh Chouhan (a four-time incumbent CM) in Madhya Pradesh or Vasundhara Raje in Rajasthan completely. Neither is close to the current central leadership, but both remain the BJP’s most popular leaders in their states, and have significant support among the newly elected MLAs.

“You cannot take Chouhan lightly, despite this kind of a mandate. He continues to be the sole leader in the state who can communicate with the electorate, cutting across differences, and is the party’s most visible face. The same is with Raje. Forming a government without them may be possible in the honeymoon period, but one cannot ensure stability if they are not in the loop,” a senior party leader said.

In their first reactions Sunday, all BJP leaders – including Chouhan – were careful to credit the victories to Modi.

Prahlad Singh Patel, one of the Union ministers in the Madhya Pradesh race, who won from Narsinghpur, posted a photo of PM Modi on X, with the note: “Desh mein ek hi guarantee chalti hai (Only one guarantee works in the nation).”

Liz Mathew and Vikas Pathak write

As the BJP shone brightly in Madhya Pradesh on Sunday registering a huge win in the assembly elections, victory eluded 12 ministers of the Shivraj Singh Chouhan cabinet, including Home Minister Narottam Mishra.

Mishra lost from Datia seat by a margin of 7,742 votes to Congress candidate Rajendra Bharti. Ministers Arvind Bhadoria from Ater, Kamal Patel from Harda and Gaurishankar Bisen from Balaghat are among those who faced defeat.

Prem Singh Patel from Badwani, Mahendra Singh Sisodiya from Bamori, Rajvardhan Singh Dattigaon from Badnawar, Bharat Singh Kushwaha from Gwalior rural, Ramkhelawan Patel from Amarpatan and Suresh Dhakad from Pohri could not make to the list of winning candidates. (PTI)

Senior BJP leader and Madhya Pradesh in-charge P Muralidhar Rao has been working on the ground in the state since November 2020 to strengthen the organisation and regain the party’s support base, which it lost to the Congress in the 2018 elections.

In an exclusive interview to The Indian Express after the results, Rao speaks about the factors that led to the BJP’s massive win in Madhya Pradesh, a state where it has been in power since 2003 barring an 15-month break in 2018. (Read more)

“MAHILA sashaktikaran ki aawaaz hoon; main Shivraj hoon, main Shivraj hoon (I am the voice of women’s empowerment; I am Shivraj, I am Shivraj).”

Whatever the BJP leadership’s plans for him now that the party seems headed for a win, it might find it hard to dismiss the claim of incumbent four-time Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who led the battle from the front, particularly on the strength of his schemes for women.

To do that, Chouhan actively embraced the limelight in a way that few in the Narendra Modi-centric party have dared before. The once self-effacing leader, whose humble image was seen as his USP, this time even was the star of his government’s ‘The Ladli Show’, where he took questions from an awed and enthusiastic young girl – who covered everything from Chouhan the child of a poor family who led an agitation as a seven-year-old; to Chouhan the “gold-medallist” MA student; to Chouhan the CM, loved by the women of the state as their “mama (uncle)” and who cares for them equally; and even Chouhan the singer. (Read more)

Madhya Pradesh is a state where agriculture has done well over the last two decades, especially under Shivraj Singh Chouhan who may well be chief minister again after the Bharatiya Janata Party’s emphatic Assembly elections win defying earlier predictions.

During 2013-14 to 2022-23, MP’s farm sector registered an average annual growth of 6.1 per cent. That’s more than the national average of 3.9 per cent for these 10 years.

The extent of transformation that has marked Chouhan’s largely unbroken tenure as chief minister since the end of November 2005 — drawing comparisons with what Partap Singh Kairon accomplished in post-Independence Punjab — can be gauged by a few statistics. (Read more)

Madhya Pradesh leader of opposition Govind Singh lost from the Lahar seat in the Bhind district by 12,397 votes against BJP's Ambrish Sharma. Singh, a Congress leader since 1993, had won from Lahar seven times in a row.

A close associate of senior Congress leader and Rajya Sabha MP Digvijaya Singh, the LoP polled 62,950 votes, while BJP's Sharma emerged as the winner with 75,347 votes. (PTI)

After the setback in Karnataka, there could not be a more handsome outcome for the BJP than the assembly results declared on Sunday. It has retained one state and gained two more. The two Congress governments that lost to the BJP were not exactly unpopular, the party made every effort to match the welfare populism of the BJP, both the defeated Congress governments spent considerable energy and resources on public outreach and yet, they were outsmarted by the BJP.

Election analysis will have to take a moment of deep breath to answer the how and why of the outcome. Meanwhile, we will come across reports of clever micro-management by the BJP and its deep organisational strength buttressed by RSS cadres. Much will be said about the party’s welfare schemes and the governance skills of its leaders. However, the BJP’s victories in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh should draw attention to the deeper tendencies which have laid the foundation of positive electoral outcomes for the party not just today but rather consistently over the past decade – the hiccups have been very few. (Read more)

The counting of votes in three out of four states today showed that less than one per cent of the voters exercised the 'none of the above' (NOTA) option in the just-concluded assembly polls, according to the election commission.

In Madhya Pradesh, 0.99 per cent of the voters went for the NOTA option out of total voter turnout of 77.15 per cent.

Talking to the news agency PTI on the NOTA option, Pradeep Gupta of Axis My India said NOTA has been used from .01 per cent to a maximum of two per cent. If anything new is introduced, its effectiveness depends on its result or performance. "I had written to the government that if NOTA's effectiveness has to be made in the real sense, then NOTA should be declared as the winner if the maximum number of people use this option," he said. (PTI)

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is addressing party workers from BJP's headquarters on DDU Marg in New Delhi. 

The Bharat Adivasi Party registered its first victory in Madhya Pradesh by winning the Sailana seat of Ratlam district.

The party's Kamleshwar Dodiyar defeated the nearest rival and Congress candidate Harsh Vijay Gehlot in Sailana constituency by a margin of 4,618 votes as per the Election Commission.

This is the first time that the Bharat Adivasi Party, headquartered in Rajasthan, has registered a victory in any election in Madhya Pradesh. Sailana seat of Ratlam is located on the borders of Rajasthan. (PTI)

As of Sunday afternoon (December 3), trends for the state Legislative Assembly elections in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, and Telangana showed the BJP taking the lead in the first three states. With this, the party has asserted its presence in three large states in northern India, in what is also called the ‘Hindi heartland’.

BJP leaders told The Indian Express that the results have exceeded their expectations. Despite the exit polls predicting a tight contest in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, the BJP has managed to score an impressive margin ahead of the opposition Congress party. Further, it has gained a significant lead in Chhattisgarh, where it was seen as lagging behind the Congress during the campaign.

Kamal Nath: Congress president of Madhya Pradesh, Kamal Nath, when asked about teh dismal show of Congress in Madhya Pradesh, said his party could not communicate with the voters.

"We accept the results of the assembly elections. I congratulate the BJP. I hope, the way the public gave him support, he stands upto it. I still have hopes from the voters of Madhya Pradesh. We will discuss why we lost and could not communicate to the voters, we will also speak to the candidates in the coming days," he said.

BJP leaders have credited Prime Minister Narendra Modi's “charismatic” leadership and development agenda for the party's success in three states, with Home Minister Amit Shah asserting that people have put their stamp of approval on PM Modi's “good governance”.

???? ?????? ?? ?? ?????? ??? ???? @narendramodi ?? ?? ??????? ???? ??? ???? ????? ?? ?????????? ??????? ?? ?????? ?? ???? ?? ???? ???

?????? ????? ?? ???????? ???? ????? ?? ?????? ???? ?? ???? ???? ?? ??? ???? ?? ???? ?? ???? ?????? ???? ???? ?? ??? ?? ????????? ??????? ????…

— Amit Shah (@AmitShah) December 3, 2023

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?? ??????? ??? ?? ??? ??????????? ???? @ChouhanShivraj, ?????? ??????? ???? @vdsharmabjp ?? ???? ????? ?????? ?? ???…

— Jagat Prakash Nadda (@JPNadda) December 3, 2023

Riding on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s popularity, its organisational strength as well as on the goodwill created by the welfare schemes of the Shivraj Singh Chouhan government, the BJP won Madhya Pradesh. But what explains its impressive show in Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan? Our expert, Liz Mathew, explains

As BJP moves towards a win in 3 states — Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh and Congress in Telangana, here’s a look at how the political map of India changes.

 

 

 

 

 

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A post shared by The Indian Express (@indianexpress)

Madhya Pradesh incumbent Chief Minister and BJP leader, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, addresses the media following the party's substantial lead in the state elections. Chouhan underscores the success of BJP's policies and their adept execution as key factors contributing to another potential win for the party in Madhya Pradesh. 

It’s never easy to call an election; with the benefit of hindsight, everyone attempts to explain the results. A complex interplay of factors influences elections — from organisational strength to poll management and strategy, from the choice of candidates to issues resonating with the people. An important ability is also being able to listen to the music underlying the words. Shivraj Singh Chouhan did it in Madhya Pradesh, and it may not be only luck that did it for the Congress in Telangana. Shivraj read the data to get the message, and Congress defied old wisdom in Telangana.

 P Vaidyanathan Iyer unpacks the lesson from Madhya Pradesh and Telangana election results.

BJP has won 40 seats in Madhya Pradesh and is leading in 124 others, according to the latest ECI update. Congress has won 10 seats and is leading in 55 others. The Bharat Adivasi Party has won one seat. 

As election results showed an overwhelming majority for the BJP in Madhya Pradesh, Congress leader Sanjay Nirupam termed the results "shocking" and said that an analysis is required as Shivraj Singh Chouhan's government had seemed unpopular.

"BJP's victory in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh is shocking. In MP, Shivraj Singh Chouhan's government seemed unpopular but has won the elections. We will have to do the analysis of the results," he told the news agency PTI.

VIDEO | "BJP's victory in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh is shocking. In MP, Shivraj Singh Chouhan's government seemed unpopular but has won the elections. We will have to do the analysis of the results," says Congress leader @sanjaynirupam on assembly election… pic.twitter.com/j8Y26BbsLG

— Press Trust of India (@PTI_News) December 3, 2023

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his first reaction to the Madhya Pradesh win, thanked the voters for their "unwavering support". 

"The results in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan indicate that the people of India are firmly with politics of good governance and development, which the @BJP4India stands for," he wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.

We bow to the Janta Janardan.

The results in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan indicate that the people of India are firmly with politics of good governance and development, which the @BJP4India stands for.

I thank the people of these states for their unwavering…

— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) December 3, 2023

All the talk about the BJP looking at an alternative leadership in Madhya Pradesh receded into the background on a day Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan made a strong statement about his popular acceptability as the party appeared set to retain power with a stunning two-thirds majority.

The BJP had chosen to head into the assembly polls without naming a chief ministerial face in any of the states. However, Chouhan has emerged as a favourite to remain at the helm in MP despite the presence of some challengers. (PTI)

As the vote-counting drama unfolds, the BJP secures a comfortable lead in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, with an ambitious aim to capture Chhattisgarh from the Congress, BJP leader Smriti Irani attributes the Congress's losses to the Gandhi family's sharp criticism of Prime Minister Modi. Irani's remarks add a layer of analysis to the electoral dynamics, pointing to the influence of political narratives on the election outcomes.

In his first reaction to the election results, Congress party chief Mallikarjun Kharge thanked the people of Telangana for the mandate and termed the party's performance in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan as "disappointing". 

"The Congress party fought a spirited campaign in all these four states," he said, adding, "We will overcome temporary setbacks and prepare ourselves fully for the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections along with the INDIA parties."

I thank the people of Telangana for the mandate we have received from them.

I also thank all those who voted for us in Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. Our performance in these three states have no doubt been disappointing, but with determination, we reaffirm our…

— Mallikarjun Kharge (@kharge) December 3, 2023

Madhya Pradesh has been a tough fight for the BJP with the fatigue factor associated with sitting Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who has been in power for close to two decades, but it is now clear that the party has managed to overcome this and is leading in 168 seats, while Congress is leading in 61.

Follow our tracker for the latest list of ECI-declared winners. 

Track how each constituency has fared this year, compared to the 2018 elections.

Several of the MPs who contested the Assembly polls and won will have to quit one of the seats in the next 14 days, else they stand to lose their Parliament membership, an expert said citing provisions of the Constitution.

The BJP fielded 21 MPs, including Union ministers Narendra Singh Tomar, Prahlad Singh Patel and Faggan Singh Kulaste, in the assembly polls — seven each in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, four in Chhattisgarh and three in Telangana. 

"If they don't, on expiry of 14 days, they will lose their membership of Parliament. However, they can continue as member of the state legislative assembly," Constitution expert and former Lok Sabha secretary general P D T Achari said citing Prevention of Simultaneous Membership Rule issued by the president in 1950 under Article 101 of the constitution. (PTI)

BJP has won three seats in MP and is leading in 161 seats, according to the ECI website. Congress, meanwhile, is leading in 65 seats. 

Madhya Pradesh CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan today took to X (formerly known as Twitter) to share a short selfie video, thanking supporters for facilitating BJP's predicted win. "Today, through your love and support, Bharatiya Janata Party has achieved historic success in Madhya Pradesh," he said.

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— Shivraj Singh Chouhan (@ChouhanShivraj) December 3, 2023

BJP state President VD Sharma is a happy man today as BJP soars ahead of Congress in Madhya Pradesh. this seems to be a vindication as exit polls predicted that Congress has a strong chance of dethroning the ruling Shivraj Singh Chouhan government in the state.

MP Election Results 2023 Live Updates

Madhya Pradesh is a state where agriculture has done well over the last two decades, especially under Shivraj Singh Chouhan who may well be chief minister again after the Bharatiya Janata Party’s emphatic Assembly elections win defying earlier predictions.

During 2013-14 to 2022-23, MP’s farm sector registered an average annual growth of 6.1 per cent. That’s more than the national average of 3.9 per cent for these 10 years.

The extent of transformation that has marked Chouhan’s largely unbroken tenure as chief minister since the end of November 2005 — drawing comparisons with what Partap Singh Kairon accomplished in post-Independence Punjab — can be gauged by a few statistics.

Between 2004-05 and 2021-22, total agricultural land or net sown area (NSA) in MP has risen just 5.7 per cent, from 149.75 lakh to 158.23 lakh hectares (lh). But its gross cropped area (GCA) — from the same land being cultivated once or more than once in a year — has gone up by 48.7 per cent, from 202.03 lh to 300.49 lh. MP’s GCA is the highest for any state today; in 2004-05, it ranked fourth — behind Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra and Rajasthan.

Harish Damodaran writes

MP Election Results 2023 Live Updates

The Union Ministers who were fielded in Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections to fight anti-incumbency sentiment against the Bharatiya Janata Party are faring well in their constituencies, with the exception of Faggan Singh Kulaste.

Kulaste is currently trailing by 11,560 votes in his constituency Niwas.

Meanwhile, Union Minister Narendra Singh Tomar is leading by 3,700 votes in Dimani. He had earlier faced flak over his son featuring in video leaks talking about cash transactions. 

Union Minister and prominent OBC face Prahlad Patel has a lead of 6,521 votes in Narsinghpur, in the Mahakoshal region. 

BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya is also leading by 19,940 votes in the Indore-1 Assembly constituency. 

Moreover, the BJP is doing marginally better in the Malwa region, which is considered a bellwether region of the state. 

Most notably, the state's Home Minister Narottam Mishra is trailing by 2,243 votes in Datia. The Congress has fielded Rajendra Bharti, who has been contesting against Mishra since 2008, and was defeated by a thin margin of 2,656 votes. The party had earlier given ticket to Avdhesh Nayak, a Brahmin face with an RSS background, and a staunch rival of Mishra, who was earlier given a ticket. Both men have buried their differences and have bowed to take on Mishra.

MP Election Results 2023 Live Updates

Incumbent Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan credited Prime Minister Narendra Modi's poll campaign in the state. He added that the people of the state have "immense faith" in Modi. 

"Double engine government, the work done by the Central Government under the leadership of the Prime Minister in Delhi, we implemented it here and the schemes made here, the wonderful journey that we traveled from Ladli Lakshmi to Ladli Brahmin, the poor, the farmers, the nephews- The work done for the nieces also touched the hearts of the people," he added. 

He further credited various BJP leaders, including Union Home Minister Amit Shah, and party national president J P Nadda for contributing in the ruling party's return to power in Madhya Pradesh.

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— Shivraj Singh Chouhan (@ChouhanShivraj) December 3, 2023

The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is all set for a comeback as it has crossed the halfway mark to form the next government in Madhya Pradesh. Currently, it is leading in 155 seats, while the Congress is leading in 73. The opposition party had hoped to return to power in the heartland state, seizing on “anti-incumbency” against the BJP, which has been ruling the since 2003, barring a 15-month period during December 2018-March 2020.

In the 15 Assembly polls held in Madhya Pradesh between 1952 and 2018, the incumbent government has only failed to return to power on six occasions. In four of these elections, the turnout increased from the previous polls. In 2003, for instance, the incumbent Congress was defeated by the BJP with the voter turnout increasing by 7-percentage points from 1998. However, on eight occasions when the state returned the incumbent government to power, six followed increases in turnout.

Last time, a higher turnout did displace the BJP from power, but the Congress victory margin was very narrow and the BJP ended up toppling the Kamal Nath government that came to power.

This time, the turnout has increased from 74.97% in 2018 to 76.22%.

Incumbent Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Union Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia watched a live news telecast of election results in Bhopal today.

According to latest estimates, the ruling BJP is leading in 155 seats, while the Congress is leading in 73. 

According to latest estimates, the ruling BJP is leading in 155 seats, while the Congress is leading in 73. 

According to the Election Commission, the BSP is leading in one seat, while the Bharat Adivasi Party id also leading in one. 

Whatever the BJP leadership’s plans for him now that the party seems headed for a win, it might find it hard to dismiss the claim of incumbent four-time Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, who led the battle from the front, particularly on the strength of his schemes for women.

To do that, Chouhan actively embraced the limelight in a way that few in the Narendra Modi-centric party have dared before. The once self-effacing leader, whose humble image was seen as his USP, this time even was the star of his government’s ‘The Ladli Show’, where he took questions from an awed and enthusiastic young girl – who covered everything from Chouhan the child of a poor family who led an agitation as a seven-year-old; to Chouhan the “gold-medallist” MA student; to Chouhan the CM, loved by the women of the state as their “mama (uncle)” and who cares for them equally; and even Chouhan the singer.

Chouhan’s campaign, in fact, almost entirely gambled on his schemes for women, including his poll-time announcement of a 35% quota for many state government jobs. The CM firmly believed that women would deliver the state to him – they add up to 2.67 crore, over 48 per cent of the total 5.52 crore voters in the state. This is crucial considering the fact that women outnumber their male counterparts in at least 18 of the 230 Assembly seats

Chouhan’s me-and-mine campaign was stark given that in his rallies during the Madhya Pradesh campaign, the BJP refrained from mentioning local leaders and sought votes in the name of the party.

Read our report here

Riding on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s popularity, its organisational strength as well as on the goodwill created by the welfare schemes of the Shivraj Singh Chouhan government, the BJP appears to have taken a comfortable lead in Madhya Pradesh. And with the trends at 11:05 am showing the party gaining an edge over the incumbent Congress in Rajasthan and inching ahead in Chhattisgarh, the BJP is heading towards a decent performance in the five state elections.

Despite the so-called anti-incumbency factor in Madhya Pradesh, where the party has been in power for two decades except for a 15-month gap starting in 2018 during which Kamal Nath-led Congress was in government, the BJP is marching ahead to a historic win in Madhya Pradesh, a state that both the BJP and the RSS consider to be another Hindutva bastion after Gujarat.

At 11:05 am, the trends showed that BJP leading in 150 seats, pushing down the Congress, which was expected to take advantage of the boredom factor against the Chouhan administration, to 69.

According to BJP leaders, the strong push from the party came in the four weeks ahead of voting on November 17. “It was almost like a surgical strike but with our organisational strength and mobilisation capacity,” said a BJP leader who was involved with the election planning in Madhya Pradesh. Party sources pointed out that while Modi led the campaign in Madhya Pradesh, Union Home Minister Amit Shah had taken control of the electioneering on the ground level.

Read Liz Mathew's analysis here

According to the latest data from the Election Commission website, the ruling BJP is leading in 150 seats while the principal opposition Congress is leading in 69.

Three other parties are leading in one seat each. These are: the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), in Sumawali constituency; the Prahar Janshakti Party, in Bhainsdehi constituency; and the Bharat Adivasi Party, in Sailana constituency.

According to early trends, the ruling BJP is currently leading in 156 seats and the Congress in 71.

The halfway mark to form the government in Madhya Pradesh is 116.

The Congress, which largely focused on local issues — barring the caste census demand raised across all poll-bound states, which is part of its Lok Sabha plank — put forth local faces to lead its election campaign in Madhya Pradesh. In contrast, the BJP’s campaign – particularly in states like Madhya Pradesh where it has a base – was more akin to a campaign for the Lok Sabha elections, which are still several months away. Prime Minister Narendra Modi remained its star campaigner in every state, with local campaigns tailored to capitalise on his mass appeal.

For example, the opening lines of a song that was played at the beginning and end of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s poll rallies in Madhya Pradesh went: "Modi ke dil mein MP, MP ke dil mein Modi (Modi has MP in his heart; MP has Modi in its heart)."

In MP, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, the Chief Minister for close to two decades, was not the declared CM face this time. Thrown in the electoral mix were Union ministers like Narendra Singh Tomar, a Thakur leader from the Chambal region, Prahlad Singh Patel, an OBC Lodhi leader, and Faggan Singh Kulaste, an Adivasi leader. The mix sent out a strong signal that the CM post was open, in case the party returned to power.

The Congress CM candidates across states kept the campaign fully local. In MP, too, Kamal Nath, even though not officially declared as the party's CM face, made headlines much more than the party’s central leadership.

An astute politician who has worked with the three generations of Gandhis — Indira, Rajiv, Sonia and Rahul — Kamal Nath, who was born in Kanpur to an established business family, is at the other end of the spectrum from incumbent Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, whose roots are in an OBC agrarian family from Vidisha.

Ever since he was appointed as the Madhya Pradesh Congress chief, Nath has had to deal with the tag of being an outsider to the politics of Madhya Pradesh. Brought up in Kolkata, Nath has never dabbled in state politics.

Born to a Brahmin family, he neither has the backing of any caste even though he has represented the tribal-dominated since 1980. Contrary to Chouhan’s commoner and simple image, Nath is seen as a money-bag politician, who has a close association with several big industrial houses (his declared worth in Lok Sabha affidavit is Rs 134.24 crore).

However, Nath’s relation with Madhya Pradesh can be traced back to 1979, when former prime minister Indira Gandhi had described him as her “third son” who helped her take on the Morarji Desai-led regime in 1979.

While introducing him to the people of Chhindwara, Gandhi had said: “This is my third son. Please vote for him.” That eventually led to the slogan “Indira ke do haath, Sanjay Gandhi aur Kamal Nath“.

Besides being among Sanjay Gandhi’s closest friends, Nath was also Rajiv Gandhi’s trusted lieutenant, tasked with managing allies and the opposition as he had wide acceptability. He served in various ministries in the Union government under prime ministers PV Narsimha Rao and Manmohan Singh.

It was under his leadership that the Congress won the previous Assembly election held in 2018, with him becoming the chief minister. However, his government fell in 2020 after Jyotiraditya Scindia, who is now a Union Minister, left Congress to join BJP with 21 other MLAs. 

According to early trends, the ruling BJP is currently leading in 140 seats and the Congress in 87.

The halfway mark to form the government in Madhya Pradesh is 116.

As per the Election Commission, three candidates from the Gondvana Gantantra Party are currently leading in their respective constituencies.

They are:

1. Arvind Singh Tekam, from the Barwara seat. The EC has also declared the BJP candidate, Dhirendra Bahadur Singh Dhiru, and the Congress candidate, Vijay Raghvendra Singh (Basant Singh), as having 'lost' from this seat.

2. Aman Singh Porte, from the Shahpura seat. The Congress candidate, Bhoopendra Maravi (Babloo), is currently at second place. 

3. Engg. Kamlesh Tekam, from the Bichhiya seat. Narayan Singh Patta, the Congress candidate, is currently at second place. 

? On October 10, Congress MP Rahul Gandhi addressed a gathering at a Jan Akrosh (public anger) rally in tribal-dominated Shahdol district in Madhya Pradesh. He said that Madhya Pradesh has become a “laboratory of scams” in the last five years. He also reiterated his party’s demand for the enumeration of people on caste basis, and challenged Prime Minister Narendra Modi to release the data of the socio-economic census done by the UPA government.

? On November 13 at a rally in Neemuch, Rahul brought up OBC representation in BJP-ruled Madhya Pradesh. He said that out of “53 officers” in Madhya Pradesh only one was from the OBC community. Rahul added that the state is the “corruption capital” of the country, accusing the ruling BJP of indulging in rampant corruption and stealing from the people of MP.

? The next day, in Tikamgarh, he accused the BJP government of corruption in spending money from the Rs 7,000 crore package for Bundelkhand region, approved during the previous UPA rule, and claimed people did not get even Re 1 out of it.

Beginning November 4, Prime Minister Narendra Modi campaigned extensively across Madhya Pradesh, with his speeches focusing on targeting Congress and highlighting the welfare measures of the ‘double engine’ BJP governments at the state and Centre.

? Addressing a rally in Ratlam on November 4, Modi said, “The competition between two Congress leaders in Madhya Pradesh, tearing each other’s clothes, is just a trailer. The real picture of the Congress will be seen after the BJP’s victory on December 3.” He added that Congress leaders in MP are like “actors and their speeches sound like lines from a movie script” while claiming there is infighting in the state’s senior leadership.

? The next day, in Seoni, he announced the extension of the free ration scheme for another five years so that people “don’t go to sleep hungry”. He said, “These people’s stoves never went cold, their mothers never went without food, and their children never went to sleep hungry. That’s why, despite this scheme set to complete in December, I have resolved to provide free ration for the next five years."

? On November 7, he accused the Congress of “hating Dalits”. At a rally in Sidhi, he attacked the Congress for boycotting a meeting on the appointment of the Chief Information Commissioner, two days after the main opposition party claimed it was “kept in the dark” over selection of new CIC Heeralal Samariya, the first Dalit to have been appointed to the post.

? In Morena on November 11, Modi accused Congress of playing with national security, and said that one of the first scams that came to light after Independence was associated with the defence forces. He added that the Congress has dragged its feet on implementation of the ‘One Rank One Pension’ (OROP) scheme for defence forces.