NEW DELHI: Notwithstanding thumping majority in the Lok Sabha, the Narendra Modi government will continue to be bogged down in the Rajya Sabha where it may gain a majority only by April 2024, close to the next general elections.
With the ruling BJP and allies having 99 members in the Rajya Sabha, a gap of 25 seats is difficult to be covered by the end of 2021 as the BJP leaders have been claiming. It means the same scenario that the previous BJP government faced for the past five years in its several laws stuck in the Rajya Sabha will prevail for next five years.
The Rajya Sabha members are elected for six years by the Assembly members and the BJP’s numbers in the Assemblies are still not that good to gain a majority in the Rajya Sabha to implement its ideas fast.
Two or three seats gained by the BJP from one or the other state would be balanced by the Congress gains in four states it rules — Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Karnataka. Moreover, there are not many seats for the grab until next April when 54 seats fall vacant.
Many of these seats are already held by the BJP and its allies and so not much difference will be achieved in April. The BJP is claiming to gain much from Maharashtra, Haryana and Jharkhand that go to Assembly polls but that will not make much difference as three of five Haryana seats are already held by the BJP and the elections are to take place for only seven of 19
Maharashtra seats, including those held by NCP supremo Sharad Pawar, his general secretary Majeed Memon and Cong''s Hussain Dalwai while one seat is of union minister Ramdas Athawale and another of Shiv Sena that the BJP can''t usurp. Also in Jharkhand, elections are to be held for only two of six seats, making very little difference as to who wins.
The BJP is counting on winning nine of 11 seats falling vacant in November next year but that will be balanced by the Congress in Rajasthan where the BJP cannot retain any of its three MPs, including former minister Vijay Goel, nor can it get elected two of the three seats it holds in Madhya Pradesh.
The next big round of elections for 19 seats become due only in April 2022, but the BJP won''t gain since those retiring are six nominated members it had chosen and other seats are from Kerala and Punjab where it has no way to win.
Another 54 seats fall vacant in June and July 2022 but their fate will also be decided by the Assembly elections falling in between.
The BJP floor managers have to be reconciled on not having a majority for an easy sail of the government''s business but they would certainly bank upon the non-NDA parties like Biju Janata Dal, Telangana Rashtra Samiti and YSR Congress Party that had supported on several crucial Bills in the past.
