Uttar Pradesh

• 11 Apr 2023

RLD Stripped of State Party Status by Election Commission

Why in News?

On 10 April 2023, the Election Commission of India issued an order stripping the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), which won eight seats in the assembly elections, as a state-level party in Uttar Pradesh. After this order, now RLD has become a registered unrecognized political party.

Key Points

• According to the commission, a party participating in the assembly elections can be recognized as a state-level party if it secures at least 6% of the total votes. RLD won eight seats in the 2022 assembly elections, although it got only 2.85 percent of the votes. Similarly, in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, RLD did not get any seats and got only 1.69 percent votes.
• Currently, the National President of the Rashtriya Lok Dal Party is Jayant Chowdhary, while the National General Secretary of the party is Girish Chowdhary. This party was founded by former Union Minister Chaudhary Ajit Singh, son of former Prime Minister Chaudhary Charan Singh.
• It is known that in the year 2022, the Rashtriya Lok Dal Party formed an alliance with the Samajwadi Party (SP) and contested 33 seats, out of which it won eight seats.
• Significantly, the Election Commission has withdrawn the regional party status from Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) in Andhra Pradesh and Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) in Uttar Pradesh. Whereas the Revolutionary Socialist Party has been declared invalid as a state party in West Bengal.
• Also, the Election Commission has given the status of the national party to Arvind Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party. Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) is recognized as a state party in Nagaland, the Tripura Motha Party in Tripura and the Voice of the People Party in Meghalaya.
• In fact, the Election Commission itself reviews the status of recognized national and state political parties, which is an ongoing process under the Symbols Order, of 1968. Since 2019, the Election Commission has upgraded the status of 16 political parties and withdrawn the current status of 9 national/state political parties.
• It is noteworthy that all political parties in India have to register with the Election Commission. Anyone can contest elections in this country and form their political party. At present, all the political parties in the country have been divided into 3 categories-
  • National Party: Those who have been given the status of National Party by the Election Commission. There are currently 6 national parties in India.
  • Regional Party: Those who have got the status of the state-level party from the Election Commission. There are now more than 50 regional parties in India.
  • Unrecognized Party: Parties that are registered with the Election Commission, but not recognized, either because they are too new or because they have not secured enough votes to be given regional party status. Now RLD has also come in this category.