Assembly Elections 2011

West Bengal verdict:
The Communist Party of India (Marxist) accepted the West Bengal verdict, saying the people had opted for a change after 34 years of Left rule.
“After the Left Front being in office for a record 34 years continuously, the people have opted for a change. The TMC-led combine has been the beneficiary of this change,” the party's Polit Bureau said in a statement.
It said, “During the more than three decades, the Left Front government recorded solid achievements — land reforms, a democratised panchayat system, progress in agriculture, assurance of democratic rights for the working people, for unity, integrity and communal harmony in the State, which are historic gains of the people of West Bengal and an enduring legacy.”
Conveying its greetings to the lakhs of people who have supported and voted for the CPI(M) and the Left Front in the most adverse circumstances and against heavy odds, the Polit Bureau said both the CPI(M) and the Left would stand by the interests of the people and struggle for the cause of the working people.
The Polit Bureau cautioned that there should be no repetition of the violence that took place against the CPI(M) and the Left Front cadres and offices in the aftermath of the Lok Sabha polls in 2009. It appealed to the people to work for peace and tranquillity.
On Kerala, it said the results showed that the people have, by and large, endorsed the past five year record of the Left Democratic Front government. The slender margin of victory for the United Democratic Front showed that there was no anti-incumbency trend, the Polit Bureau said adding that however, some caste and religious forces had worked to influence the elections.
As for the role of the Left, it said that while the results of West Bengal and Kerala would be a disappointment for the Left and democratic forces in the country, this would, by no means, make the Left policies and programmes irrelevant for the country.
“The CPI(M) and Left forces will not only continue to work for the people in West Bengal and Kerala but will vigorously pursue the struggle against the neo-liberal economic policies, defend the livelihood and interests of the working people and combat communalism and defend secularism in the country,'' the statement said.

Mamata storms Left bastion :
The Trinamool Congress-Congress alliance on Friday swept the West Bengal Assembly polls with more than a two-thirds majority, ending 34 years of Left Front rule.
Even as results were pouring in, Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee tendered his resignation to Governor M. K. Narayanan at the Raj Bhavan in the afternoon.
Accepting his resignation and, inter alia, all the other members of his Council of Ministers, the Governor requested the Chief Minister and his colleagues to continue to discharge their duties till alternative arrangements are made.
Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee called on the Governor in the evening and staked her claim to form the next government.
All set to be the State's first woman Chief Minister, Ms. Banerjee described the landslide for the alliance as a “victory for democracy, a victory for the people, a victory for maa, mati, manush [her party slogan that translated reads: mother, soil, people]” She promised “good governance, good administration, not autocracy…The people are the winners…”
Among those who fell before the Trinamool-Congress juggernaut were Mr. Bhattacharjee and 25 Ministers, including Finance Minister Asim Dasgupta, Industries and Power Minister Nirupam Sen, Housing Minister Gautam Deb and Minister for Sundarban Affairs Kanti Ganguly. In all, 34 Ministers, including the Chief Minister, were in the fray.
The Trinamool secured a majority on its own, bagging 184 of the total 294 seats. A decision on whether or not the Congress, which won 42 seats, will join the new government will be taken soon. Ms. Banerjee has, however, welcomed it and another ally, the Socialist Unity Centre of India (Communist) to join her in the next government. The SUCI has won one seat.
Pointing out that Ms. Banerjee had achieved what the Congress could not in the past years, Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee said that “the mandate was clearly in favour” of her. “In Bengal, a frail woman, within 13 years [since the Trinamool Congress was formed], could dismantle a strong CPI(M) party by reducing them not to a three-digit but a double-digit figure,” he said, adding that his party had, in its own, “humble way helped her achieve the success.”
The Left Front's tally was reduced to 62, with the Communist Party of India (Marxist), its major constituent having to content itself with 40 seats. The position of other parties in the Left Front are: the CPI (2), AIFB (11), RSP (7), SP (1) and the Democratic Socialist Party (1).
The Gorkha Janamukti Morcha won three seats and Independents two.
“This result was unexpected,” Mr. Bhattacharjee and Biman Bose, chairman of the Left Front Committee, said in a statement adding that “the Left Front promised to play the role of a responsible and constructive Opposition.”

AIADMK front victory:

The Polit Bureau welcomed the sweeping victory of the AIADMK alliance in Tamil Nadu. It said the result was a decisive rejection of the ‘corrupt misrule' of the DMK and also a verdict against corruption, which had flourished under the UPA regime.
As for Assam, it said the peace talks with the United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) and the division in the Opposition parties contributed to the Congress' victory.
The Communist Party of India said the Left Front drew lessons from the reverses suffered during the 2009 Lok Sabha elections and tried to make corrections but it was late.
“We tried our best, but the people's verdict has gone against the Left, while in Kerala the LDF put up a brave fight but lost by a slight margin. We accept the defeat with humility and will discus it,” party deputy general secretary S. Sudhakar Reddy said adding that in addition some partners such as the Janata Dal (Secular) and a faction of Kerala Congress had move away from the alliance. He said the Tamil Nadu results was positive and described it as a defeat of a corrupt regime.

Hat-trick for Gogoi :
The ruling Congress scored a hat-trick in Assam and registered a landslide victory, securing an absolute majority in the Assembly elections. It captured 78 of the 126 seats, while its coalition partner, the Bodoland People's Front (BPF), won 12 seats.
The Asom Gana Parishad and the Bharatiya Janata Party suffered a humiliating defeat, with the AGP winning only 10 seats, and the BJP's strength getting reduced to five seats. The All-India United Democratic Front (AIUDF) emerged as the second largest party with 18 seats.
The outcome has cleared the decks for Tarun Gogoi to become the second person, after the late Bimala Prasad Chalia, to don the mantle of Chief Minister for the third consecutive term.
Mr. Gogoi, who has won from Titabar by a huge margin of over 54,199 votes, told journalists that the people reposed faith in the Congress-led coalition government for bringing back peace and undertaking massive development work and welfare measures for the poor.

Health Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma scripted a record, winning with the highest ever margin of 77,304 votes. AGP president Chandra Mohan Patowary and State BJP president Ranjit Dutta were among the prominent losers.
Leader of the Opposition and former Chief Minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta won from Barhampur but lost to Environment and Forest Minister Rockybul Hussain in Samaguri.

UDF scrapes through in Kerala:
In the closest electoral battle Kerala has seen in recent decades, the Congress-led United Democratic Front has scraped past the Left Democratic Front in the 2011 Assembly elections. In the House of 140, the UDF bagged 72 seats, four more than the LDF led by the Communist Party if India (Marxist).
The Congress Legislature Party is expected to meet early next week, where a decision on the possible choice of Oommen Chandy to lead the new government is expected to be taken. Mr. Chandy had gone out as Chief Minister following the 2006 elections in which the LDF won a two-thirds majority. The UDF had scored massive wins in the 2009 Lok Sabha polls and the 2010 local body elections, but has now had to satisfy itself with a modest win.
In the nine-party UDF, the Congress has won 38 seats, the Indian Union Muslim League 20, the Kerala Congress (M) nine, the Socialist Janata (Democratic) two, and the Kerala Congress (B), the Kerala Congress (Jacob) and the RSP (Bolshevik) one each.
The CPI(M), heading the seven-party LDF, is the single largest party with 45 seats in the House. The CPI has won 13 seats, the Janata Dal (Secular) four and the RSP, the Nationalist Congress Party and LDF-backed independents two each. In the outgoing House, the LDF had 98 seats to the UDF's 42.
This was a cliffhanger of an election that could have gone either way, and there were indeed moments during the counting on Friday when a dead heat seemed certain. By giving the UDF the marginal victory, the State has stuck to a three-and-a-half decade old pattern of choosing a new coalition to run the government once every five years.
The LDF put up a strong showing despite the defeat, thanks to the absence of an anti-incumbency mood among the electorate, and a turn in the tide in its favour in the final lap on account of the ‘VS factor' — the presence of Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan at the helm of the LDF campaign.
The BJP's hopes of opening its account in the Assembly were again dashed, but it put up a notable showing in Nemom in the south and Kasaragod and Manjeswaram in the north.
 

  Woman power to the fore:

It was woman power unsheathed as the Assembly election results poured in on Friday: Mamata Banerjee in West Bengal and Jayalalithaa in Tamil Nadu swept into office on the back of humongous victories that surpassed the wildest pre-election calculations.
If the Mamata tidal wave fetched the All-India Trinamool Congress (AITC)-Congress Alliance three-fourths of the seats in the West Bengal Assembly, the story was repeated in Tamil Nadu, where the All-India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) alliance mopped up all but a few seats.
The defeat of the Left Front (LF) in West Bengal brought the curtain down on the longest running government in India and the longest running elected Communist government anywhere in the world. However, by way of compensation, the Left put up a spirited fight in Kerala, coming close to a victory and then losing by just four seats to the United Democratic Front.
The LF in West Bengal not only suffered staggering losses cutting across regional divides, many prominent names in the outgoing Cabinet also crashed out of the race. In Jadavpur, Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee was trounced by Manish Gupta, who had served as his Chief Secretary before joining the AITC. In Khardaha, Finance Minister Asim Dasgupta was defeated by industry lobbyist and AITC candidate Amit Mitra.
In Tamil Nadu, the AIADMK sweep reduced the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam-Congress Alliance to just a handful of seats. In Kolathur in Chennai, Deputy Chief Minister M.K. Stalin scraped through with a margin of 2,819 votes.
In Kerala, the Left Democratic Front nearly upset the trend of alliances alternatively taking power established since the early 1980s. Finally, in a nail-biting finish, the LDF lost to the United Democratic Front, but by a whisker. In a House of 140, the LDF won 68 seats to the UDF's 72.
And yet, these were not the only surprises in the election. In Assam, Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi pulled off a spectacular third straight win, defying predictions of a hung House.
In Puducherry, the breakaway N.R. Congress led by N. Rangasamy thumbed its nose at the parent Congress party. In a 30-member House, the N.R. Congress-AlADMK alliance bagged 21seats to the DMK-Congress' tally of nine. Remarkably, the N.R. Congress is still to be formally recognised by the Election Commission. With the trends firming up by 11 in the morning, stampeding crowds lined up outside the Kolkata and Chennai homes of Ms. Banerjee and Ms. Jayalalithaa. Both women were the picture of humility, speaking the same language and attributing their triumphs to the will of the common people.
Ms. Banerjee, who was the first to emerge outside, said her victory was the victory of maa, mati, manush [mother, motherland and the people].” She said she felt humbled by the mandate given to her.
Ms. Jayalalithaa restricted her initial appearance to a “namaste” from the balcony of her bungalow. Later, she thanked the people for reposing faith in her. She said the people had despatched a corrupt family that treated the State like its fief.