Simultaneous polls not practical, BJP eyes dividends: CPI

Communist Party of India (CPI) today said simultaneous elections to Lok Sabha and state Assemblies, though ideal, is not practical, while the ruling TRS in Telangana favoured the idea.
Instead, states where elections are due within six months of each other should be clubbed together and polls can be held there simultaneously, CPI General Secretary S Sudhakar Reddy said.
Reddy, a former Lok Sabha member, saw "political angle from BJP" in Prime Minister Narendra Modi's statement favouring simultaneous polls and said the lead party of NDA believes that it can derive political dividends all over the country with him in the saddle.

"Our opinion is: it looks ideal but it is not practical in India," he told PTI.
"They (BJP) are raising this issue for the first time because they think that with Narendra Modi as Prime Minister they will get support for the BJP up to Panchayat level, ward level... Throughout the country and in that they can capture the entire country," Reddy said.
"How can they dissolve constitutionally elected Assemblies for five years," he asked.

Several states went to polls at different times and the term of their assemblies does not end at the same time and there are issues of no-confidence motions, mid-term polls and Presidential Rules, he noted.

"Just to satisfy the lust of the BJP, the life of the Legislative Assembly cannot be cancelled. Practically it is not possible. But what we think, there is a possibility that if there is election within six months in different states, then they can be clubbed together and one election can be held," Reddy said.
"If there is life of two-and-half years or three years (still left in the Assemblies), that cannot be curtailed," the CPI leader said.
Telangana Rashtra Samiti MP Kalvakuntla Kavitha said, "My personal opinion and my party's opinion is that if elections are conducted together, we save a lot of money to the country."

Voters being educated and literate are very intelligent, especially in the south, and they had in the past given "conflict verdicts", supporting different parties at central and state levels, the Nizamabad MP said.
"If polls are held together, it will save lot of money. But then how do we organise rest of the states which still have two-three years life left? How do we handle is the question. That's up to constitutional experts to figure out," Kavitha added.