Electioneering in India By Deepak Parvatiyar September 13, 2014 It is interesting that when the first General Elections were held in 1951-52, the whole purpose of elections was challenged in the face of a fragmented Opposition. It was the Congress all the way as a party of stalwarts who had liberated the country from the British raj and Jawaharlal Nehru was the star campaigner who travelled about 40,000 kilometres to cover almost a tenth of the country’s population. He had then addressed nearly thirty-five million people of the country! Birth of Anti – Congressism The Nehruvian era was the one that saw complete domination of just one man – Nehru, till he breathed his last. The Opposition was insignificant and for a quarter of centuries after Independence there was not even a Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha for want of the required strength for the post! In 1951, the only Opposition party to have opened its account was the Communist Party of India, and that too m
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