Punjab’s politically influential Malwa belt holds key in Lok Sabha polls

Chandigarh: Malwa belt in Punjab holds political sway, influencing assembly and parliamentary elections, with AAP and SAD victories.

The Malwa belt in Punjab is always considered the biggest and politically influential region, particularly during Assembly elections, where if a party secures maximum Assembly seats in this belt, it can easily form the government in the State.

Punjab can broadly be divided into three regions — Malwa, Majha and Doaba.

Beyond the Sutlej river, it is called the Malwa region, the Doaba region falls between the Beas and Sutlej rivers, while Majha falls between the Ravi and the Beas rivers.

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As far as the parliamentary polls are concerned, eight seats — Ludhiana, Bathinda, Ferozepur, Faridkot (SC), Fatehgarh Sahib (SC), Patiala, Anandpur Sahib and Sangrur fall in the Malwa region.

Two seats — Hoshairpur (SC) and Jalandhar (SC) — are in the Doaba region. The Majha region broadly comprises three parliamentary seats — Gurdaspur, Amritsar and Khadoor Sahib.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the Congress won eight parliamentary seats in Punjab, bucking the pro-Modi trend seen across the northern and central India in that general election.