A closer analysis of certain key seats in the massive 543-seat Lok Sabha election can often, if not always, give a certain idea of the direction in which the electoral winds are blowing.
Seats like Valsad and West Delhi, dubbed as bellwether seats, have a strike rate of almost 100 percent in predicting the last 11 Lok Sabha elections, with respect to their electoral trends.
10 Bellwether Seats
Each of the 10 seats analysed below are such, that the party winning them in the last 11 Lok Sabha elections has emerged as the power at the Centre 10 times.
Let's take a closer look at these seats to analyse what are the electoral equations, this time around.
Valsad
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the fight in Valsad is primarily between BJP's KC Patel and Congress' Jitubhai Harjibhai Choudhary.
Patel had defeated Kishanbhai Patel of the Congress in the last Lok Sabha election. In that election Patel had got 55 percent of the votes, while Kishanbhai had got 36.48 percent votes.
West Delhi
West Delhi will see a three-way contest between BJP's Parvesh Verma and Aam Aadmi Party's Balbir Singh Jakhar and Congress' Mahabal Mishra.
Verma had defeated Aam Aadmi Party's Jarnail Singh in the last elections. He had got 48.30 percent of the voted, while Singh had got 28.38 percent.
Gurgaon
BJP's Inderjit Singh Rao, INLD's Virender Singh Rana and Congress' Ajay Singh Yadav are in the fray in Gurgaon.
Inderjit had defeated INLD's Zakir Hussain in the 2014 Lok Sabha election by getting almost 20 percent more votes.
Faridabad
This seat will be contested between BJP's Krishan Pal Gurjar, Avtar Singh of Congress and Navin Jaihind of the Aam Aadmi Party.
In the previous election, Krishan Pal had defeated Congress’ Avtar. He had got 57.70 percent votes against Avtar’s 16.42 percent votes.
Shahdol
Here, the battle is between BJP's Himadri Singh and Congress' Pramila Singh.
Last time, BJP's Dalpat Singh had defeated Congress candidate Rajesh Nandini Singh in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. Dalpat had got 54.22 percent votes, while Rajesh had got 29.32 percent.
After Dalpat’s death, BJP's Gyan Singh had won the bypoll for this seat.
Beed
BJP's Pritam Gopinath Munde will look to edge past NCP's Bajrang Sonawane in this battle. In the 2014 Lok Sabha election, her father Gopinath Munde had defeated NCP's Dhan Suresh Ramachandra by over 11 percent votes.
After the demise of Munde, Pritam had won the bypoll by a margin of about 7 lakh votes.
Chandigarh
This seat will witness a battle between BJP’s Kirron Kher and Congress' Pawan Kumar Bansal. Kher had defeated Bansal in the 2014 Lok Sabha election. In that election, Kher had got 42.20 percent votes against Bansal’s 26.84 percent.
North West Delhi
The electoral battle for this seat is between singer Hans Raj Hans of the BJP, Rajesh Lilothia of the Congress and Gagan Singh of Aam Aadmi Party.
In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, BJP’s Udit Raj had defeated AAP’s Rakhi Birla by almost 8 percent votes.
Ranchi
This seat is will see a head-to-head contest between Congress' Subodh Kant Sahay and BJP's Sanjay Seth.
In 2014, BJP's Ram Tahal Chaudhary had defeated Sahay by a clear margin. In that election, Chaudhary had secured 42.74 percent votes against Sahay’s 23.76 percent.
Palamu
BJP's Vishnu Dayal Ram, RJD's Jhuran Ram and CPI(M)‘s Sushma Mehta will look to secure this crucial seat.
In 2014, Ram had defeated RJD’s Manoj Kumar by more than 27 percent.
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