BJP gives allies more room

BJP leaders attribute the phenomenon to new alliances forged by the party this year because of which it had to concede greater number of seats to its partners. The BJP had contested all the 42 seats in Andhra Pradesh, managing to win only about four of them last year. This time the party will be contesting only eight seats. leaving 34 for its alliance partner Telugu Desam.

The party has conceded five more seats than it did last year to its allies in Uttar Pradesh: Loktantrik Congress, Jantantrik BSP and Samata Party besides conceding three more seats to the Unified Janata Dal in Bihar.

The BJP managed to contest one moreseat in Tamil Nadu by entering into alliance with Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) this time but at the same time conceded one seat each to its allies in West Bengal (Trinamool Congress), Haryana (Indian National Lok Dal) and Himachal Pradesh (Himachal Vikas Congress) besides contesting seven seats less than it did last year in Kerala.

The BJP meanwhile, has changed at least half a dozen candidates party’s Central Election Committee announced earlier. These include shifting Uma Bharti from Khajuraho to Bhopal and replacing its candidate from Pune, Anna Joshi with Pradeep Rawat. The BJP had earlier changed its candidate from Ahmadnagar Ghanshyam Shelar with Dilip Gandhi. It also had to persuade two recalcitrant leaders Sushma Swaraj and Sumitra Mahajan to contest from Bellary and Indore respectively.