Red signals for Left,CPI faces danger of losing national status

While the biggest shocks for the Left came in Kerala and West Bengal,the situation elsewhere was not much different and contributed.....

While the biggest shocks for the Left came in Kerala and West Bengal,the situation elsewhere was not much different and contributed significantly to the lowering of its overall tally. It lost seats in Tamil Nadu,Andhra Pradesh,Jharkhand and its hopes of making gains in Rajasthan and Bihar were dashed.

The CPI(M) and CPI managed to win just three seats outside their traditional strongholds of Kerala,West Bengal and Tripura,losing four seats that they held in Tamil Nadu,Andhra Pradesh and Jharkhand.

In Andhra Pradesh,sitting MP and CPI deputy general secretary S Sudhakar Reddy lost to the Congress in Nalgonda by 1.5 lakh votes. CPI(M) MP Babu Rao Mediyam met a similar fate in Araku. Mediyam,who represented Bhadrachalam in the current Parliament,was defeated by Congresss Kishore Chandra Suryanarayana Deo Vyricherla.

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In Tamil Nadu,where both the parties had two sitting members,the tally was reduced to one each. CPI(M)s P R Natarajan won the Coimbatore seat,while the party lost the Nagercoil (new name Kanyakumari) and Madurai seats. The CPI retained its Tenkasi seat but it lost in Chennai North and Nagapattinam.

While the CPI lost the Hazaribagh seat in Jharkhand to BJPs Yashwant Sinha,it managed to win Jagatsinghpur in Orissa.

For the CPI,more bad news could be in store. The nations second oldest party faces a strong prospect of its national party status being withdrawn by the Election Commission. One of the major benefits of being a national party is that candidates put up by the party at any election in any constituency fight on a common election symbol. Therefore,if the CPI loses its status,its candidates in the states other than where it is recognised as a state party will not be able to fight elections under the party symbol.

Under the Election Symbols (Reservation and Allotment) Order,1968,for a political party to maintain its national status,it has to field candidates in at least four states and poll at least six per cent votes out of the total votes polled. At the same time,the party has to be represented in the Lok Sabha by at least four members. As an alternative,the party has to get two per cent of the total seats in the Lok Sabha from at least three states or should be a party recognised as a state party in at least four states.

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While the CPI meets the criteria relating to four members in Lok Sabha,it may well fall short of the second one the one that makes it mandatory for a national party to get at least six per cent of the total votes polled in the four states.

The actual position would become clear only after the entire data becomes available. But we are worried now, acknowledged a party leader,who requested anonymity. CPI secretary general A B Bardhan refused to even discuss the subject.

(with inputs from Maneesh Chibber)