Patna Sahib Lok Sabha Seat 2024: Holy City For Sikhs Is A BJP Bastion In Bihar Since 2009

Patna Sahib Lok Sabha Election 2024: The Patna Sahib seat has been a BJP bastion since its establishment, with Shatrughan Sinha and Ravi Shankar Prasad winning it on the saffron party's ticket.

Former Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad won the Patna Sahib seat in 2019 against Shatrughan Sinha, who fought on a Congress ticket. ( Image Source :PTI )

The Patna Sahib Lok Sabha constituency is among the 40 seats in Bihar that will be up for grabs in a couple of months. The Patna Sahib Lok Sabha constituency has had 2 representatives since its inception in 2008 — actor-turned-politician Shatrughan Sinha and former Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad.

Patna Lok Sabha Seat Since Independence

Till 2008, Bihar's capital Patna had only one Lok Sabha seat — Patna. However, the Patna Sahib constituency had to be carved out in the Patna district due to the delimitation exercise in 2008. Along with Patna Sahib, another Lok Sabha seat, Pataliputra, was given to the region.

Between 1957 and 2008, the Patna seat was represented by various parties. The seat was represented in the Lok Sabha by prominent educationists, freedom fighters, and politicians like Sarangdhar Sinha, Ram Dulari Sinha, Mahamaya Prasad Sinha, C P Thakur, Shailendra Nath Shrivastava, and  Ram Kripal Yadav

For the first Lok Sabha elections in 1952, the region was divided into four constituencies — Pataliputra, Patna East, Patna Central, and Patna-cum-Shahabad. They became Patna, Nalanda, Barh, and Shahabad Lok Sabha seats, respectively, in 1957. The Patna seat in Patna city was further divided into two constituencies — Patna Sahib and Pataliputra — in 2008.

The Patna Sahib Lok Sabha constituency had 21 lakh voters in 2019 and recorded a turnout of around 46%.

The Patna Sahib seat has been a BJP bastion with Shatrughan Sinha winning it twice and then losing it to BJP's Ravi Shankar Prasad, while fighting on a Congress ticket. Its sister constituency in Patna city, Patalputra, has been represented by BJP's Ram Kripal Yadav since 2014.

Stalwarts Who Represented Patna In Lok Sabha Over The Years

Academician Saranghadhar Sinha, who was also the vice-chancellor of Patna University, became Patna's first MP in 1952 when he won the Pataliputra seat. He did not advocate familialism in politics and pushed for women's participation in the field. He won the Patna seat again in 1957 but did not contest in 1962 and urged the Congress to field Ram Dulari Sinha.

Freedom fighter Ram Dulari Sinha became reconstituted Patna's first woman MP. Earlier,  Congress leader and freedom fighter Tarkeshwari Sinha won the Patna East seat in 1952. Ram Dulari Sinha also became the first woman from Bihar to become the Governor of a state when she was handed the charge of the office in Kerala in February 1988.

Ramavatar Shastri, one of the tallest Communist leaders in Bihar, represented the Patna seat in Lok Sabha for two terms between 1967 and 1977. He was known as a staunch CPI-M leader who actually believed in the Left ideology. He was also known to be one of the most down-to-earth political leaders who would commute on a cycle. The Times of India in a 2010 report quoted former head of the political department at Patna University Bachchu Sinha as saying that Shastri was against caste politics. He won the seat again in the 1980 elections.

Freedom activist Mahamaya Prasad Sinha won the seat on a Janata Party ticket in 1977, defeating Ramavatar Shastri by a record margin of 3,23,125 votes. The margin remains a record even today. A powerful orator, Sinha was the 5th CM of Bihar and the first head of a non-Congress government in the state in 1967.

Congress leader Chandreshwar Prasad Thakur wrested the seat from Ramavatar Singh in 1984. He is the first medical scientist from India to get a World Health Organization lifetime achievement award for his work on kala-azar. Thakur later joined the BJP and went on to hold the Water and then the health portfolios in the Atal Bihar Vajpayee government. His son Vivek Thakur is now a BJP Rajya Sabha MP. CP Thakur won the seat again in the 1998 bypoll and the 1999 Lok Sabha elections.

Patna Sahib Lok Sabha Seat 

The Patna Sahib Lok Sabha constituency, considered a high-profile seat, was established in 2008 after the Bihar reorganisation and went up for polls in 2009.

Actor Shatrughan Sinha won the Patna Sahib constituency for the first time in 2009. That year, he was contesting against another actor Shekhar Suman (Congress) He won the seat again in 2014. He was a Rajya Sabha member earlier and held the Shipping and Health portfolios in the Vajpayee Cabinet. He is now a TMC leader and the incumbent MP from Asansol in Bengal.

Former Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad is the present MP from Patna Sahib. He wrested the seat from Shatrughan Sinha, who fought the poll on a Congress ticket, in 2019 Prasad has held the portfolios of Communications, Electronics and IT, and Law & Justice since his entry to the Rajya Sabha in 2000.

Patna Sahib — Guru Gobind Singh's Birthplace

The Patna Lok Sabha seat is historically and culturally sacred to the Sikh community as this is the place where the last Sikh guru Gobind Singh was born. The Guru Gobind Singh Gurdwara was built in Patna to revere him and is among the holiest shrines of the Sikhs. The Patna Sahib Gurdwara is among the 5 'takhts' of the Sikhs.