2022 Legislative Assembly Elections saw the emergence of many regional parties representing local aspirations and opportunities. New parties played vital roles in Punjab Goa, and Manipur elections. Their advantage was their ability to promote concerns that mattered to the local voters, especially those ignored by the big national parties or regional established parties.
Punjab witnessed the dramatic launch of a new party right before the elections. Punjab Lok Congress (PLC) was founded in a hurry by Punjab’s former Chief Minister, Amarinder Singh on 2 November 2021, following a split with INC’s Punjab chapter. PLC officially registered with the Election Commission of India on 31 October 2021 and by 28 December 2021, entered into an alliance with BJP and SAD(S) to contest the 2022 Punjab Legislative Assembly election at 22 seats. The five-term MLA Amarinder Singh was defeated by AAAP with a margin of 19,873 votes. Other new entrants did not suffer such an ignoble fate.
Goa has been home to a spate of regional upstarts like the MAG and GFP which were initially promising, but was unable to sustain their momentum and stalled when they aligned themselves with the national parties. The ever-hopeful Goans took another chance and gave a new party of youngsters an opportunity- Revolutionary Goans Party (RGP) won St Andre constituency to send 28-year-old Viresh Borkar to the legislative assembly. All in all, they won 93,255 votes, contested 38 seats and won their first constituency. Seems like good news.
The most incredible story comes from Manipur. The Kuki People’s Alliance (KPA) was formed by two ex-bureaucrats on January 12, 2022, a couple of months before the election, and contested seats: Saikul and Singhat. Impressively, they won both seats by attracting an astounding 18,808 votes, mostly from Kuki voters. An incredible 100% strike rate.
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