Kalyan Singh Tomar’s two sons aged 10 and 6 go to a private school in Dimani town about 3-4 km from their Kachnodha village. While he is okay working hard to pay the annual fee of more than ₹30,000 for each of his children, what aches him is that there is a government school right in front of his house and three generations of his family donated pieces of land for the school’s construction and its expansion.
Dimani is an Assembly constituency in the Morena district of Madhya Pradesh’s politically significant Gwalior-Chambal region that sends 34 legislators to the State’s 230 MLA-strong Assembly. In the 2018 Assembly polls, the Congress had won 26 seats while the BJP could only manage seven, down from its tally of 20 in 2013 polls.
The Congress’s gains in the region went in vain in March 2020 when 22 MLAs from across the State resigned from the party following Jyotiraditya Scindia, now a Union Minister, and joined the BJP. At least 16 of them were from the Gwalior-Chambal region.
Mr. Scindia, fondly addressed as ‘Maharaj’, is the scion of the erstwhile royal family of Gwalior which ruled most parts of the region.
The move had brought down the 15-month Kamal Nath government and ensured a return of a BJP government with Shivraj Singh Chouhan as the Chief Minister. The State went to bypolls in November 2020 for 28 seats. The BJP won nine out of 16 seats that went to bypolls from the region, taking its tally to 16 and regaining its lost ground with Mr. Scindia’s popularity.
This time around, both the parties have been campaigning aggressively in the region, part of which also has significant presence of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and the Samajwadi Party (SP) due to its proximity with Uttar Pradesh and caste equations in the Chambal belt.
In two minds
However, the voters from the region who had decisively sided with the Congress in 2018 appear in two minds in 2023. While they have visible dissatisfaction with the BJP, several welfare schemes of Mr. Chouhan’s government give a breather to the party.
Many of those who are looking for a change claim that it is difficult to trust the Congress if it will fulfil its promises.
Even as most of them do not reveal their preference, they admit that the election is going to be close and even triangular in several seats.
Sitting under a tree outside his home, Mr. Tomar tells The Hindu that his grandfather had first donated a small piece of land for the establishment of a primary school. “Then my father gave some part of the land at the backside. About 6-7 years ago, when the government wanted to turn it into a middle school (class VIII), I donated more land. All we had hoped that our kids will be able to get good education,” he says.
Even though the school looks clean and freshly painted, Mr. Tomar claims it was only done barely a month ago. Blaming the quality of education in government schools, Mr. Tomar says he goes to find work in cities like Delhi when during the agricultural off-season. “I want my kids to study so that they can get out of this place,” he says, accusing the government of failing on several other fronts such as electricity, water and in tackling the stray cattle problem.
“Last time, I voted for the BJP but this time I am thinking of going with the Congress,” he says.
About 200 metres from the school, Bhavna Shrivas sits with her husband, three children and mother-in-law outside her house which had collapsed about three months ago in the recent monsoon.
She complains that while leaders from several parties visited her and assured help, she did not receive a penny of assistance.
“My children and I sleep outside on cots. We have covered some area with tarpaulin sheet to bathe. My husband now goes to meet the MLA and other leaders but nobody meets him. Nobody listens to us in government offices too,” she says.
Ms. Shrivas, however, still prefers Mr. Chouhan and the BJP as she and her husband claim that the Congress government did “nothing” for them.
“Fifteen months are more than enough but they did not give us anything. Even now they are only making promises, whereas Shivraj ji gives us several benefits without asking. I get ₹1,250 every month (under Ladli Lakshmi scheme). He has also given cycles to school kids,” she adds.
More than 200 km from Dimani, Nitish Gupta, a snack shop owner in Shivpuri’s Kolaras has been a “loyal BJP supporter” for several years but admits that the government has failed in providing jobs to the youth.
“So many young people in my village are disappointed. Whatever exam they give either gets cancelled or some scam happens,” he says.
Tighter contest
Mr. Gupta says that he is not sure who he will vote for this time but claims that “it is not going to be easy for any party”. “This time it’s even a tighter contest than the last time,” he adds.
At many places across the region, people voiced similar concerns but remained unclear about their preference.
In Datia’s Garhi village, a group of young men praised several works done by the BJP government, including roads, electricity and water. They then join a BJP nukkad sabha in the village. However, while the sabha was under way, some of those men join a group of Congress workers which was awaiting party candidate Rajendra Bharti.
Datia is the constituency of State Home Minister Narottam Mishra, who is seeking another term from here.
Brajmohan Sharma, a Congress worker, says, “People are scared to voice their choices openly here. Such is the fear of Mr. Mishra.”
“The Congress’s voter is silent in entire Gwalior-Chambal and will only come out on the polling day,” he claims.
While the BJP and the Congress have left no stone unturned in wooing the electors of the region, the election is also a matter of prestige for many leaders in both parties.
Mr. Scindia, who was credited for the Congress’s performance in the region last time, has held back-to-back rallies in almost all parts of Gwalior-Chambal in order to repeat a similar performance for the BJP this time.
In most rallies, he has asked the people if he made the right decision by bringing down the Congress government. Mr. Scindia also represented the Shivpuri-Guna Lok Sabha seat in the Parliament from 2002 to 2019.
In Guna’s Bamori, Roshan Dhakar and his friend Sumit Ojha say that they have no anger for Mr. Scindia but will go with the Congress this time due to the candidate Rishi Agrawal. “Maharaj is still our leader but the BJP candidate [sitting MLA and State Government Minister Mahendra Singh Sisodia] is not at all accessible,” says Mr. Dhakar, an eatery owner.
Once a colleague of Mr. Scindia in the Congress, former Chief Minister Digvijaya Singh also hails from the region and from the erstwhile royal family of Raghogarh in Guna district.
Mr. Singh’s son Jaivardhan Singh, who has won from Raghogarh seat in 2013 and 2018, is again in the fray. The father-son duo has also aggressively worked in the region to negate the Scindia impact this time.
At a public meeting in Guna recently, Mr. Singh had said that Mr. Scindia is “like his son” but he will never forgive him for causing the fall of the Congress government.
Another senior BJP leader, Union Minister Narendra Singh Tomar and sitting MP from Morena has been fielded by the BJP from Dimani along with being tasked to improve the party’s performance in the Chambal belt. Mr. Tomar, however, is currently battling a controversy after some videos allegedly showing his son discussing transactions worth hundreds of crores of rupees went viral.
Mr. Mishra, who had won from Datia by about 2,600 votes last time, is also facing the dual challenge this time — from the Congress candidate Mr. Bharti and his former party colleague Awadesh Nayak, who joined the grand old party in August.
Mr. Nayak was earlier fielded by the Congress from the seat but his name was dropped following protests by Mr. Bharti. The two leaders, however, are now campaigning together and told The Hindu that their target is to oust Mr. Mishra from the seat.
Several other heavyweights are also in the fray from the region. They include Congress’s Leader of the Opposition in the current Assembly Dr. Govind Singh who is hoping for a sixth term from Lahar in Bhind district; Congress’s six-term MLA from Shivpuri district’s Pichhore seat K.P. Singh, who has been fielded from the Shivpuri seat this time as the grand old party had speculated Mr. Scindia’s candidature from the seat.
