Maldives Parliamentary Elections / President Muizzu's landslide victory in parliamentary elections, is it bad news for India?

Maldives Parliamentary Elections: In the parliamentary elections held in Maldives on Sunday, the People's National Congress led by President Mohammed Muizzu has achieved a huge majority by winning more than 60 seats. Voting was held to elect MPs in a total of 93 constituencies of Maldives and this election is being considered very important for the country's President Muizzu, whose policies are being monitored by India and China who are trying to increase influence in Maldives. .

Relations between India and Maldives were once very close, but after President Mohammed Muizzu came to power, relations between India and Maldives have turned sour. Lok Sabha elections are going on in India too and while Maldives' eyes are fixed on India's elections, India's eyes are also fixed on Maldives' parliamentary elections. Maldives President Mohammed Muizzu was elected President only last year and after the victory, he will be elected President once again.

How did the relations between India and Maldives become sour?

After the promotion of Lakshadweep by Indian PM Modi, there was an uproar on social media due to which there was bitterness in the relations between India and Maldives. After this, the hydrographic agreement was canceled by Moijju and the ship going towards Pakistan was stopped by India near the port of Mumbai. Because it was suspected that its nuclear materials could be used secretly. Maldives' growing friendship with China and due to some reasons the relations between India and Maldives turned sour. This is the reason why India would like that President Muizzu's party does not get majority in the parliamentary elections so that they have to work under the pressure of the opposition.

Voting started at 8 am, continued till 5 pm

According to the news of news portal “Adhadhu.com”, voting for the 20th People's Majlis (Parliament) in Maldives started at 8:00 am and concluded by 5:30 pm. As soon as voting ended, election officials sealed ballot boxes across the country and then counting began. According to the information given by the Election Commission (EC), till 5:00 pm, 2,07,693 people voted, according to which 72.96 percent voting took place. This includes 1,04,826 men and 1,02,867 women. A total of 2,84,663 people were eligible to vote.

According to the news of “PSMnews.mv”, a total of 602 ballot boxes were kept in Maldives and three other countries for the parliamentary elections. Polling stations were also set up in at least 34 resorts, prisons and other industrial islands. According to the news, the countries where ballot boxes were kept for voting outside Maldives include Thiruvananthapuram in India, Colombo in Sri Lanka and Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia.

368 candidates from six parties are contesting for the country's parliamentary elections. These six parties include Muizzu's People's National Congress (PNC), the main opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) and 130 independents. According to news portal "Sun.mv", PNC has fielded 90 candidates, MDP has fielded 89, Democrats have fielded 39, Jamhoori Party (JP) has fielded 10, Maldives Development Alliance (MDA) and Aadhalath Party (AP) have fielded four each. And Maldives National Party (MNP) has fielded two candidates.

Muizz has won a landslide victory

The report quoted preliminary results as saying that the Muizzu-led PNC won more than 60 seats in the 93-member People's Majlis, which is almost a two-thirds majority. According to the trends, Muizzu-led PNC won 67 seats, followed by MDP with 12 seats and independent candidates won 10 seats. The remaining seats went to other parties.

The election is important for Muizzu, seen as a pro-China leader, as just days before the election, opposition parties demanded investigation and impeachment of the President following the leak of reports on his alleged corruption from 2018. . However Muizzu rejected this allegation. Moreover, ever since Muizzu assumed office, MPs have blocked the inclusion of three of his nominees in the cabinet.