The Election Commission of India (ECI) has designated the Jana Sena Party (JSP) as a ‘recognised regional party’ and reserved the ‘glass tumbler’ symbol for it. A JSP release said that the ECI wrote a letter to that effect to the party president and Deputy Chief Minister K. Pawan Kalyan.
The ECI recognition came in the wake of the JSP’s stunning victory in the general elections held in May 2024, when the party achieved cent per cent success by winning in all the Lok Sabha (two) and Assembly (21) constituencies where it contested.
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Mr. Kalyan founded the JSP a decade ago i.e. in March 2014 but it stayed away from the electoral arena in order to focus on strengthening the party. It extended outside support to the TDP-BJP alliance in 2014-19.
In its first outing in the 2019 elections, JSP suffered an ignominious defeat by winning a lone Assembly seat. It was in alliance with the Left parties and Bahujan Samaj Party at the time. Mr. Kalyan was himself crushed in Gajuwaka and Bhimavaram constituencies by the YSR Congress Party wave that swept the State.
The JSP proved its mettle in the 2024 elections by notching 100% ‘strike rate’ albeit with the support of its allies Telugu Desam Paty (TDP) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP.)
The party had a problem in securing the ‘glass tumbler’ symbol as some parties challenged its allotment in the High Court, which ruled in JSP’s favour shortly before the elections. ECI then ordered that the glass symbol be frozen so that it cannot be allotted to independent candidates or candidates of registered unrecognised parties.