Assam: Despite sizeable presence of Muslim voters, BJP has an edge over Congress in second phase
Guwahati: With electioneering for the second phase of polling coming to an end on Wednesday, the focus will be on Muslim voters who have sizeable presence on at least three out of five Lok Sabha seats going to polls on Friday in Assam.
If BJP is largely banking on division of Muslim votes, the Congress has been appealing to Muslim voters to go for strategic polling to defeat the saffron party.
The polling will be held in the five constituencies---Karimganj, Silchar (both in southern Assam’s Bengali-majority Barak Valley), Nagaon, Darrang-Udalguri and Diphu. Nagaon is held by the Congress while the others are with the BJP.
Except Diphu which is reserved for Scheduled Tribes, all the other four constituencies have the presence of sizeable Bengali-speaking Muslim voters. Bengali Hindus also play a significant role in deciding the fate of candidates on Silchar and Karimganj seats.
While Karimganj leads with over 55.7 percent Muslim voters, Silchar has less than 40 percent, Nagaon 58 percent, and Darrang-Udalguri about 40 percent.
The ensuing Lok Sabha election is also significant as after the last year delimitation several Muslim-majority Assembly segments, which were parts of erstwhile Kaliabor (now Kaziranga) parliamentary seat, were added to the Nagaon seat, thereby substantially increasing the number of its Muslim voters.
In the wake of changed demography, it is believed that except Nagaon, the contest would be straight between the BJP and the Congress on most of the seats. The AIUDF has made the contest triangular in Nagaon.
It is significant that the BJP had managed to win central Assam’s Nagaon seat four times---1999, 2004, 2009 and 2014 despite the majority of Muslim voters. The Congress succeeded in resting the seat from BJP in 2019. The AIUDF has fielded a strong candidate Aminul Islam, who is an MLA from the seat. His contest will be with sitting MP Pradyut Bordoloi of the Congress and Suresh Borah of the BJP.
The BJP is having an edge on the Silchar seat but faces a tough challenge from the Congress in Karimganj. The BJP replaced Silchar MP Rajdeep Roy with a state minister Parimal Suklabaidya and re-nominated sitting MP Kripanath Malla in Karimganj.
The contest in Silchar will be between Suklabaidya and the Congress’ Surya Kanta Sarkar. In Karimganj, the Congress’ Hafiz Rashid Ahmed Choudhury, who is a senior lawyer, is presenting a strong fight to the sitting BJP MP Kripanath Mallah.
Earlier the BJP had an advantage in both Silchar and Karimganj seats as Hindus-Bengali are in a majority in Silchar while Muslims could not contest from Karimganj as it was reserved for Scheduled Caste (SC). After delimitation, Silchar is now an SC-reserved seat while Karimganj became a general seat.
The BJP is hardly facing any contest in the Diphu seat in Karbi Anglong district.
The BJP has an advantage in Diphu Lok Sabha seats; it rules the autonomous Karbi Anglong Autonomous Council and North Cachar Hills Autonomous Council.
The ruling party is also confident to retain the Darrang-Udalguri seat as half of the constituency spreads inside the Bodoland Territorial Region (BTR). The BJP-United People’s Party Liberal combine is in power in the Bodoland Territorial Council which administers the BTR.
