Congress facing the ignominy of no Leader of Opposition post after Lok Sabha election results 2019

It is a blast from the past for Congress. Hoping for a major revival in Lok Sabha election 2019, the Congress was in for rude shock as trends and results started to come in on Thursday. The Bharatiya Janata Party-led National Democratic Alliance had taken the expressway to power, leaving the opposition in tatters.

While the BJP alone was leading in over 290 seats, bettering its 2014 Lok Sabha election performance, the Congress was once again staring at the possibility of not getting the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha. The party was leading in only 51 Lok Sabha seats as per trends at 12:25 pm.

A party needs to win at least 10 per cent of Lok Sabha seats to be eligible for the post of Leader of Opposition. So the minimum seats required for the same is 54 as the Lok Sabha has 543 elected members.

In the last Lok Sabha election, the Congress had won just 44 seats which meant that it was not eligible for the post of Leader of Opposition even though it was the second largest party after BJP in the Lok Sabha.

Except Punjab and Kerala, the Congress was wiped out of the electoral map with single digits leads in all the major states. In several states it was completely blanked out.

Even Congress president Rahul Gandhi was facing at a stunning defeat at the hands of BJP candidate Smriti Irani in the Amethi Lok Sabha seat of Uttar Pradesh. However, Rahul was leading for Kerala’s Wayanad, the second Lok Sabha seat from where he was contesting.