From doctors and professors to actors and cricketers, the 18th Lok Sabha which convenes for the first time on Monday accounts for a wide range of professions among the newly-elected MPs. The number of MPs who have declared their professions as social workers, farmers and business people, however, has declined in comparison to the 17th Lok Sabha.
An analysis of professions of the MPs in the 17th and 18th Lok Sabha, the information for which is available on the Lok Sabha website, shows that agriculture, social service and business continue to be the top professions.
Several MPs have multiple professions listed in their Lok Sabha profile. While the 17th Lok Sabha had seen altogether 559 MPs — including those who won through bypolls — the 18th Lok Sabha has 542 elected members, with a bypoll pending in Waynad after its MP Rahul Gandhi vacated it to retain his second seat, Rae Bareli.
Agriculture, a sector that represents the largest chunk of the electorate and covers the largest geographical area of the country, has maintained its highest representation in the House at 179 MPs or 33% of total House strength. However, there has been an 8 percentage point decline compared to the previous Lok Sabha, which had 230 MPs, or 41.14%, associated with agriculture as a profession. Among the five parties with the most MPs, the BJP has the most members involved in agriculture at 79 out of its total 240 MPs, followed by the Congress at 29 out of 99, the Samajwadi Party (SP) at 23 of 37, the Trinamool Congress (TMC) at two of 29, and the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) at nine of 22.
In the 17th Lok Sabha, 148 BJP MPs had declared agriculture as their profession, followed by 16 from the Congress, seven from the DMK, six from the SP, and two from the TMC. While the DMK and TMC have largely maintained their MP strength from the previous Lok Sabha, the Congress and SP have made considerable gains in numbers, while the BJP’s tally has fallen significantly.
There are 115 MPs, or 21.22% of the House, who are involved in social service or activism in the 18th Lok Sabha. The number of social workers has seen a 13.13 percentage point decline from the previous Lok Sabha, in which 192 MPs, or 34.35%, were engaged in social service.
At 52, the BJP has the most MPs involved in social service in the new House though its tally has declined from the previous House, in which it had 98 MPs in this field. The Congress and SP saw the number of MPs in social service rise from 22 to 25 and from three to eight, respectively. The TMC and DMK saw their figures fall, from 10 to 9 and from four to one, respectively.
The MPs who declared business as their profession account for the third largest share in the new House – 100 members or 18.45% of the House. However, this figure has declined by 7.31 percentage points from the previous House, which had 144 MPs, or 25.76%, involved in business.
Among those who have declared specific fields within business, the new House has one automobile dealer, two involved in building and construction, two entrepreneurs, two in the transport business, and one industrialist. The previous Lok Sabha had 11 MPs involved in building or construction, 15 industrialists, three traders, two in the transport business, two in the oil industry, one who operated a driving school, one in the tourism sector, one civil contractor, one diya producer, one jeweller, one restaurateur, one business adviser, one in the chemical and pharmaceuticals industry, and one in the pharmacy business.
In the new House, the BJP has 48 MPs involved in business, down from 78 in the previous Lok Sabha. There are 19 such Congress MPs, up from 10 in the older House. While the SP still has just one businessperson, the DMK is down to six from 11 and the TMC is up to three from two.
While all members of the new House are politicians, only 70, or 12.92% of them, have declared politics as their profession. In the previous House, there were 69 career politicians or political workers. Just 27 of the BJP’s MPs are politicians, down from 29 in the previous House. The Congress currently has seen an increase to 11 from 10 on this score, and the SP from three to seven. The DMK and TMC have however seen decline in this regard, from three to one and three to two, respectively.
Those involved in law account for the fifth largest share in the new House with their number at 39, 7.2% of the total MPs. Though most of these MPs are advocates, the new Lok Sabha has one former judge of the Calcutta High Court, Abhijit Gangopadhyay from the BJP. In the 17th Lok Sabha, there were 47 MPs, or 8.41%, in the legal profession.
The new House has 28 MPs, or 5.17%, who are doctors or involved in medicine, including two cardiologists and one radiologist. In the previous House, there were 37 doctors accounting for 6.62% of the House, including several specialists from orthopaedics and advanced laparoscopic surgery to neurosurgery.
Among those in the film, TV and music industry, the new Lok Sabha has fewer such MPs – there were 22, or 3.94%, in the previous House compared to just 12, or 2.21%, now. The new House also has three sportspersons, including two cricketers, compared to six in the 17th Lok Sabha.
There are some MPs with unconventional professions – the Telugu Desam Party’s G M Harish Balayogi is described as a “technologist” and Independent MP Amritpal Singh, a pro-Khalistan leader who contested the polls from jail, listed his profession as “dependent on parents” in his election affidavit.
The previous Lok Sabha had several MPs with less common professions, from a former director general of Doordarshan and an Indian Air Force fighter pilot to a bhikshaatan (dependent on alms) and a hedge fund manager, to a physical education teacher.
