1977 elections in India

Template:Infobox election Template:Politics of India

Elections in India in 1977 included Legislative Assembly (Vidhan Sabha) elections in several Indian states, including Goa, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Tamil Nadu, and West Bengal.

Overall Results

Date(s)	State	Government before election		Chief Minister before election	Government after election		Chief Minister after election	Maps
19 March 1977	Kerala	Template:Full party name with color	C. Achutha Menon	Template:Full party name with color	K. Karunakaran
		Template:Full party name with color		Template:Full party name with color
10 June 1977	Tamil Nadu		President's Rule		Template:Full party name with color	M. G. Ramachandran
	Rajasthan		President's Rule		Template:Full party name with color	Bhairon Singh Shekhawat
	Uttar Pradesh		President's Rule		Template:Full party name with color	Ram Naresh Yadav
	Punjab		President's Rule		Template:Full party name with color	Parkash Singh Badal
	Odisha		President's Rule		Template:Full party name with color	Nilamani Routray
	Himachal Pradesh		President's Rule		Template:Full party name with color	Shanta Kumar
	Bihar		President's Rule		Template:Full party name with color	Karpoori Thakur
14 June 1977	West Bengal	Template:Full party name with color	Siddhartha Shankar Ray	Template:Full party name with color	Jyoti Basu
	Goa, Daman and Diu	Template:Full party name with color	Shashikala Kakodkar	Template:Full party name with color	Shashikala Kakodkar
9 July 1977	Jammu and Kashmir	Template:Full party name with color	Sheik Abdullah	Template:Full party name with color	Sheik Abdullah
6 October 1977	Haryana	Template:Full party name with color	Devi Lal	Template:Full party name with color	Devi Lal
	Madhya Pradesh		President's Rule		Template:Full party name with color	Kailash Chandra Joshi
18 November 1977	Nagaland		President's Rule		Template:Party color cell	United Democratic Front (Nagaland)	Vizol Koso
31 December 1977	Tripura		President's Rule		Template:Party color cell	Communist Party of India (Marxist)	Nripen Chakraborty

Legislative Assembly elections

Bihar

Party		Seats contested	Seats won	Seats Change	Vote Share
Template:Full party name with color	311	214	Template:Increase 214	42.7%
Template:Full party name with color	286	57	Template:Decrease 110	23.6%
Template:Full party name with color	2206	24	Template:Increase 7	23.7%
Template:Full party name with color	73	21	Template:Decrease 14	7.0%
Template:Full party name with color	16	4	Template:Decrease 14	0.9%
Template:Full party name with color	31	2	Template:Increase 1	0.4%
Template:Full party name with color	26	1	New	0.8%
Template:Full party name with color	21	1	New	0.5%

Goa, Daman and Diu

Template:Main Template:Election table |- align=center !style="background-color:#E9E9E9" class="unsortable"| !style="background-color:#E9E9E9" align=center|Political Party
!style="background-color:#E9E9E9" |Seats contested
!style="background-color:#E9E9E9" |Seats won
!style="background-color:#E9E9E9" |Number of Votes
!style="background-color:#E9E9E9" |% of Votes
!style="background-color:#E9E9E9" |Seat change
|- | Template:Party color cell |align="left"|Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party||29||15||116,339||38.49%||Template:Decrease 3 |- | Template:Party color cell |align="left"|Indian National Congress||27||10||87,461||28.94%||Template:Increase 9 |- | Template:Party color cell |align="left"|Janata Party||30||3||69,823||23.10%||Template:Increase 3 |- | Template:Party color cell |align="left"|Independents||57||2||28,022||9.27%||Template:Increase 1 |- | |align="left"|Total||145||30||302,237|||| |- |}

Himachal Pradesh

Rank	Party	Seats Contested	Seats won	% votes
1	Janata Party	68	53	49.01
2	Indian National Congress	56	9	27.32
3	Independent	68	6	21.10
	Total		68

Source

Jammu and Kashmir

Template:Main Elections for the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir were held in June 1977, which are generally regarded as the first 'free and fair' elections in the state.Template:Sfn Jammu & Kashmir National Conference, newly revived from the former Plebiscite Front, won an overwhelming majority and re-elected Sheikh Abdullah as the Chief Minister. Template:Election results

Kerala

Party Wise Results

Party	Seats	Alliance
Indian National Congress (INC)	38	United Front
Communist Party of India (CPI)	23
Kerala Congress (KEC)	20
Indian Union Muslim League (IUML)	13
Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP)	9
Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPM)	17	Opposition
Bhartiya Lok Dal (BLD)	6
All India Muslim League (Opposition) (AIML)	3
Kerala Congress (Pillai Group) (KCP)	2
Independent (IND)	9
Total	140

Madhya Pradesh

Template:Main Source:

SN	Party	Seats Contested	Seats won	Seats Changed	% Votes
1	Janata Party	319	230	N/A	47.28%
2	Indian National Congress (I)	320	84	-136	35.88%
3	Akhil Bharatiya Ram Rajya Parishad	4	1	N/A	2.88%
4	Independent	320	5	-13	15.35%
	Total		320

Odisha

Party	No. of candidates	No. of elected	No. of votes	%
Janata Party	147	110	2527787	49.2%
Indian National Congress	146	26	1594505	31.0%
Independents	264	9	738545	14.4%
Communist Party of India	25	1	183485	3.6%
Communist Party of India (Marxist)	4	1	45219	0.9%
All India Jharkhand Party	10	0	25002	0.5%
Socialist Unity Centre of India	6	0	18773	0.4%
Jharkhand Party	2	0	7233	0.1%

Punjab

Party		contested	Seats won	change in seats	popular vote	%
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|	Shiromani Akali Dal	70	58	Template:Increase 34	17,76,602	31.41%
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|	Janata Party	41	25	(new)	8,47,718	14.99%
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|	Indian National Congress	96	17	Template:Decrease 49	18,99,534	33.59%
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|	Communist Party of India (Marxist)	8	8	Template:Increase 7	1,98,144	3.50%
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|	Communist Party of India	18	7	Template:Decrease 3	3,72,711	6.59%
bgcolor="Template:Party color"|	Independents	435	2	Template:Decrease 1	5,41,958	9.58%
	Others	14	0	-	18,686	0.33%
Total		682	117		56,55,353

Tamil Nadu

Template:Main The sixth legislative assembly election of Tamil Nadu was held on June 10, 1977. All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) won the election defeating its rival Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK). M. G. Ramachandran (M.G.R), the AIADMK founder and a leading Tamil film actor, was sworn in as Chief Minister for the first time. The election was a four cornered contest between the AIADMK, DMK, the Indian National Congress (INC) and the Janata Party. Earlier on 17 October 1972, M.G.R had founded the AIADMK following his expulsion from the DMK after differences arose between him and DMK leader M. Karunanidhi. On 31 January 1976, Karunanidhi's government was dismissed by the central government of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi citing corruption charges against Karunanidhi and President's rule was imposed on the state. Karunanidhi had been at odds with Indira Gandhi over his opposition to Emergency and allied with Janata Party founded by Jayaprakash Narayan. Meanwhile, M.G.R had developed a close relationship with Indira Gandhi and supported the Emergency. M.G.R remained as Chief Minister until his death in 1987, winning the next two elections held in 1980 and 1984.

Election map of results based on parties. Colours are based on the results table on the left

Template:Election table |- ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:left;vertical-align:top;" |Alliance/Party !style="width:4px" | ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:right;" |Seats won ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:right;" |Change ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:right;" |Popular Vote ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:right;" |Vote % ! style="background-color:#E9E9E9;text-align:right;" |Adj. %^‡ |- ! style="background-color:#009900; color:white"|AIADMK+ alliance ! style="background-color: Template:Party color" | | 144 | +142 | 5,734,692 |style="text-align:center;vertical-align:middle;" colspan=2 | 33.5% |- |AIADMK ! style="background-color: #008000" | | 130 | +130 | 5,194,876 | 30.4% | 35.4% |- |CPI(M) ! style="background-color: #000080" | | 12 | +12 | 477,835 | 2.8% | 33.0% |- |FBL ! style="background-color: #800000" | | 1 | – | 35,361 | 0.2% | 62.0% |- |IND ! style="background-color: olive" | | 1 | – | 26,620 | 0.2% | 42.9% |- ! style="background-color:#FF0000; color:white"|DMK ! style="background-color: Template:Party color" | | 48 | -136 | 4,258,771 |style="text-align:center;vertical-align:middle;" colspan=2 | 24.9% |- |DMK ! style="background-color: #FF0000" | | 48 | -136 | 4,258,771 | 24.9% | 25.3% |- ! style="background-color:#00FFFF; color:black"|Congress alliance ! style="background-color: #00FFFF" | | 32 | +24 | 3,491,490 |style="text-align:center;vertical-align:middle;" colspan=2 | 20.4% |- |INC ! style="background-color: #00FFFF" | | 27 | +27 | 2,994,535 | 17.5% | 20.8% |- |CPI ! style="background-color: #0000FF" | | 5 | -3 | 496,955 | 2.9% | 20.4% |- ! style="background-color:yellow; color:black"|Janata ! style="background-color:yellow" | | 10 | +10 | 2,851,884 |style="text-align:center;vertical-align:middle;" colspan=2 | 16.7% |- |JNP ! style="background-color: #FFFF00" | | 10 | +10 | 2,851,884 | 16.7% | 16.8% |- ! style="background-color:gray; color:white"|Others ! style="background-color:gray" | | 1 | -7 | 751,712 |style="text-align:center;vertical-align:middle;" colspan=2 | 4.4% |- |IND ! style="background-color: #666666" | | 1 | -7 | 751,712 | 4.4% | – |- | style="text-align:center;" |Total ! style="background-color: " | | 234 | – | 17,108,146 | 100% | style="text-align:center;" | – |- |}Template:Refbegin ‡: Vote % reflects the percentage of votes the party received compared to the entire electorate that voted in this election. Adjusted (Adj.) Vote %, reflects the % of votes the party received per constituency that they contested.
Sources: Election Commission of India Template:Refend

Tripura

Performance of the political parties in this election

Party	Seats contested	Seats won	No. of votes	% of votes	1972 Seats
Communist Party of India	10	0	6,266	0.84%	1
Communist Party of India (Marxist)	55	51	352,652	47.00%	16
Indian National Congress	60	0	133,240	17.76%	41
Janata Party	59	0	78,479	10.46%	-
All India Forward Bloc	1	1	7,800	1.04%	0
Revolutionary Socialist Party	2	2	12,446	1.66%	-
Proutist Bloc of India	6	0	2,139	0.29%	-
Congress for Democracy	59	0	66,913	9.08%	-
Tripura Upajati Juba Samiti	28	4	59,474	7.93%	0
Independents	48	2	30,862	4.11%	2
Total	328	60	750,271

West Bengal

Template:Main Legislative Assembly elections were held in the Indian state of West Bengal on 14 June 1977. The polls took place after the ousting of Indira Gandhi's government at the Centre. The Left Front won a landslide victory, much to the surprise of the left parties themselves. The 1977 election marked the beginning of the 34-year Left Front rule in West Bengal, with Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader Jyoti Basu leading the first Left Front cabinet.

Party		Candidates	Seats	Votes	%
Left Front	Communist Party of India (Marxist)	224	178	5,080,828	35.46
	All India Forward Bloc	36	25	750,229	5.24
	Revolutionary Socialist Party	23	20	536,625	3.74
	Revolutionary Communist Party of India	4	3	75,156	0.52
	Marxist Forward Bloc	3	3	58,466	0.41
	Biplobi Bangla Congress	2	1	35,457	0.25
	LF independent	1	1	32,238	0.22
Janata Party		289	29	2,869,391	20.02
Indian National Congress (R)		290	20	3,298,063	23.02
Communist Party of India		63	2	375,560	2.62
Socialist Unity Centre of India		29	4	211,752	1.48
Indian Union Muslim League		32	1	54,942	0.38
Workers Party of India		2	1	29,221	0.20
Jharkhand Party		2	0	5,701	0.04
Republican Party of India		3	0	1,652	0.01
All India Gorkha League		2	0	810	0.01
Bharater Biplobi Communist Party		1	0	489	0.00
Independents		566	7	912,612	6.37
Total		1,572	294	14,329,201	100
Source: ECI

Sources

• India after Gandhi: The History of the World's Largest Democracy. Pan Macmillan.

External links

• Election Commission of India