Congress no longer has the home advantage

Early trends show a dismal picture for Congress as it stares at decimation even in its traditional strongholds, including Jyotiraditya Scindia's Guna, Chhattisgarh's Durg -- seats the party had retained even in the Modi wave of 2014.

Congress' national tally has shown only a small improvement from 44 in 2014 to leads in 52 in 2019 elections. What has been shocking for the Congress is the early lead Smriti Irani has stolen over Congress president Rahul Gandhi in Gandhi family's borough Amethi.

Scindia has been delivered a tough blow in Guna by his own parliamentary representative K P Yadav, who was fielded by BJP. Yadav stole an early lead, which has now touched 51,000. Guna has been Gwalior's Scindia family's constituency since 1960s first represented by Madhavrao Scindia and then his son Jyotiraditya. In Madhya Pradesh, where Congress was able to retain Guna and Chhindwara in Modi wave of 2014, the party has only retained Chhindwara.


The Congress has been unable to retain the edge in Hindi heartland states of Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh -- where it had recently formed governments. In Chhattisgarh, the party is leading in 2 of 10 seats -- Mahasamund and Bastar.