Satna (Madhya Pradesh): The party-hoppers are changing political equations in Maihar constituency of Satna district.
Initially the contest was between the BJP and the Congress, but four-time MLA from the constituency Narayan Tripathi who recently launched a new political outfit, Vindhya Janata Party (VJP) is back in the contest.
He is pulling out all the stops to maintain his superiority in the constituency.
Many senior leaders of the BJP have defected to the Congress. Similarly a few Congress leaders have either taken the BJP membership or have decided to contest as independents.
The defections may, however, damage the prospects of the two main parties in the state, the ruling BJP and the Congress.
Representative of Member of Parliament, Sanjay Rai, left the BJP and took the Congress membership in the run-up to the election. It has shocked the BJP leaders in the constituency. Similarly, Manish Patel and Lalloo Patel joined the Congress.
As a result, the voters, belonging to the Other Backward Classes, may shift to the opposition camp. Such defections may help the VJP.
BJP candidate Shrikant Chaturvedi, Congress’s Dharmesh Ghai and VJP’s Narayan Tripathi are locked in a close contest.
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