Aizawl: A total of 6 candidates from five political parties and an independent are in the fray for elections to Mizorams‘s lone Lok Sabha seat slated for April 19, a senior election official said on Saturday.
Mizoram Additional Chief Electoral Officer H Lianzela said that none of the 6 candidates, including a female, who cleared scrutiny on Thursday, had withdrawn their candidatures till the end of the last day of withdrawal of candidature on Saturday.
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The number of contesting candidates this time is exactly similar to the number of candidates in the last Lok Sabha polls held in April 2019. In the 2019 polls, six candidates, including a female candidate, were in the fray.
The ruling Zoram People’s Movement (ZPM), which is contesting the Lok Sabha polls for the first time on its own, has fielded political debutant Richard Vanlalhmangaiha (46), while main opposition Mizo National Front (MNF) fielded sitting lone Rajya Sabha member K. Vanlalvena (54).
The BJP fielded its state president Vanlalhmuaka (53) and Congress nominated retired Mizoram Police Service (MPS) officer and former state home secretary Lalbiakzama(64), who is also a newbie in politics.
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People’s Conference (PC) party fielded well-known singer and lyricist Rita Malsawmi (46) and former BJP leader and ex-Congress worker Lalhriatrenga Chhangte (59), who lost the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, is again contesting as an independent this year.
Among the six candidates, only Chhangte had contested the Lok Sabha polls in the past and lost the assembly by-poll in 2021, while BJP’s Vanlalhmuaka had unsuccessfully contested the assembly polls three times and MNF nominee K. Vanlalvena also unsuccessfully contested the assembly polls in 2023 and assembly by-poll in 2015.
In the annal of Mizoram Lok Sabha elections since 1972, when the northeastern state elected its first MP, the ruling party in the state had won the elections on 11 occasions on its own or by forging electoral alliance with other parties, while opposition parties won only on two occasions in 1980 and 1998 by forging electoral alliance.
The Congress, which won the assembly polls five times between 1984 and 2013, had successfully contested the Lok Sabha polls on its own six times in 1984, 1989, 1991, 1996, 2009 and 2014, while the MNF, which won four state assembly polls between 1987 and 2019, came out victorious at Lok Sabha polls on two occasions- 2004 and 2019.
In 1999 when the MNF was then the ruling party in the state, independent candidate Valalzawma backed by MNF and Mizoram People’s Conference won the Lok Sabha polls.
Mizoram did not cast votes in the Lok Sabha polls in 1984 as Congress candidate Lalduhoma (now chief minister) was elected unopposed.
Although ZPM had contested the Lok Sabha polls in 2019 jointly with Congress (both opposition parties forged pre-poll alliance against the ruling MNF), this year the party will fight the Lok Sabha elections for the first time on its own.
ZPM bagged 27 out of 40 seats in the assembly polls held in November last year unseating incumbent MNF, which won only 10 seats.Over
8.6 lakh electorates, including 4.41 lakh female voters and 36,214 first-time voters, are eligible to exercise their franchise in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.
Mizoram recorded 63.13 per cent voter turnout in 2019 Lok Sabha polls and more than 80 per cent in assembly polls in 2023.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the MNF secured a vote share of 44.89 per cent, ZPM-Congress combine- 43.26 per cent, BJP-5.75 per cent, People’s Representation for Identity and Status of Mizoram (PRISM)- 2.67 per cent and the other 2.94 per cent by two independent candidates.