For parties that have a “national” status, the performance can easily be termed as dismal.
The results of by-elections to two Assembly seats in Uttar Pradesh have amply demonstrated that the BJP and the Congress have miserably failed to emerge as viable political alternatives in the state and are now losing out to fledging political outfits.
In the Nidhauli Kalan Assembly seat, the Congress and the BJP ranked third and fourth respectively, while the second position was taken by Jan Kranti Party, a political outfit floated by former BJP leader Kalyan Singh earlier his year.
The Jan Kranti Party has remained a nonentity in political circles and this is the first time that it has made its “presence” felt.
In Lakhimpur, the results were strikingly similar with the BJP stuck at the third position and the Congress at the fourth.
It was the new born Peace Party that gave a spectacular performance by ranking second here. The Peace Party is barely two years old and, till now, did not have a presence beyond eastern UP.
Nidhauli Kalan is in Etah which is in western UP, while Lakhimpur Kheri is in central UP. A few months ago, a by-election in Dumariaganj in eastern UP had put the Congress and the BJP in a similar position which proves that the trend for these two parties is all pervasive.
Another interesting feature of these by-polls is that the ruling BSP, which remains a potent political force in UP, had not contested the two elections. If the BSP was in the fray, the Congress and the BJP would have been pushed further down in the tally. Both, the Congress and the BJP, insist that they will make a spectacular comeback in the 2012 UP Assembly elections but if the by-poll results are any indication, the two parties are not only tagging behind the sp and the BSP but are also being overtaken by relatively unknown political outfits.