Outgoing Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan may have kept the integrity, poise and appeal intact but the downfall of the BJP rule in Madhya Pradesh was triggered by arrogance and non-performance of his ministerial colleagues and party MLAs.
A closer look reveals that the behaviour of the sitting MLAs and Ministers cost them dearly in the Assembly elections. The major reason behind not getting votes was that these leaders did not behave properly with the people and were not active in the constituencies.
A gazette police officer, while talking to The Pioneer, around one month ago, had claimed that the whole police staff is trying for a change in the Government. The reason, he cited for his claim was that the BJP leaders have been quite rude and bully.
Only few days before the counting, another police officer, citing the similar reason, accepted that the police personnel voted against the BJP. The postal ballots used by the police personnel showed that 80 per cent of them voted in the election.
However, going through the results of the elections, it was clear that the voters taught the leaders a lesson for their rude behavior, no matter whether the leaders belong to Congress or the BJP.
Prominent faces, who lost elections due to this reason included Leader of the Opposition in the State Assembly Ajay Singh, Deputy Speaker in the State assembly Rajendra Singh and 11 ministers including Revenue Minister Umashankar Gupta.
It was a clear message in the air that Gupta has not been cordial with the people and never worked for the people of his constituency, South-West Bhopal.
On the contrary, Congress candidate PC Sharma was considered close to the public, because he used to visit anybody, who approached him in problems.
The victory of PC Sharma is considered a major one, because he always demanded Congress ticket from Bhopal Madhya (Central) constituency, but he was fielded from South-West, which did not have his committed vote bank.
It has been quite fateful that Leader of the Opposition, who had been thriving for past three terms for forming Congress’ government in Madhya Pradesh, lost the election, when Congress is forming government.