BJP trounced the Congress in a battle of nerves between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Congress’s newly-elected President Rahul Gandhi in Gujarat and sailed through relatively easily in the hill state of Himachal Pradesh in the assembly election results announced on Monday.

The Prime Minister, who literally camped in Gujarat for the last week of the assembly polls and invited criticism about insinuating that the Congress was manipulating the State elections in connivance with Pakistan, was credited with carrying on the BJP’s victory run. The ruling party has convened a meeting of its highest decision-making body, the parliamentary board, on Monday evening. The only bit of bad news for the BJP was on account of its chief ministerial candidate PK Dhumal who was trailing in Sujanpur till late Monday afternoon.

Vote share

In Gujarat, the ruling party managed to improve its vote-share marginally from the previous polls in 2012 but its seat share has declined. In the 2012 elections, the BJP had cornered about 47.85 per cent share of votes to win 115 seats. In this year’s polls, at about 3 pm on Monday, the BJP’s vote share stood at 49 per cent and it look poised to win just about 100 seats.

However, compared to the overwhelming support the people of Gujarat had extended to candidate Narendra Modi in his election as Prime Minister in 2014, the BJP vote share eroded significantly. The BJP had managed a staggering 60 per cent of the vote share to win all 26 Lok Sabha seats.

The assembly election results show a decline of about 11 per cent votes for the BJP which is largely attributed to the articulation of the combined effect of widespread rural distress, the impact on small businesses of demonetisation and GST implementation by the Congress and its fresh crop of young leaders including Alpesh Thakur, Jignesh Mavani and Hardik Patel whose Patidar Anamat Andolan Samiti (PAAS) supported the opposition.

The Congress improved its vote share marginally but it seats share looked set to jump. The party had managed to get about 41.5 per cent of the votes in the 2017 Assembly elections, up from just about 39 per cent in 2012. The party had seen a big erosion of its vote share in 2014 to about 33.4 per cent as a Modi wave swept through the State.

Himachal polls

In Himachal Pradesh, the BJP looks set for a massive victory, winning 45 of the 68 seats in the state Assembly. The party’s vote share has jumped to 48.5 per cent from 38.5 per cent in Assembly 2012 elections. But it would be sobering to note that the party’s vote share has declined from nearly 54 per cent it got in 2014 General Elections to win all four Lok Sabha seats from the State.

The Congress saw its vote share dip a tiny bit to 41.9 per cent from the 41.8 per cent it got in 2012. The party’s seat share too is set to halve from 36 in the Assembly to about 18. The Congress can however take solace in the fact that its vote share remains mostly intact – it had polled over 41 per cent votes in 2014 General Elections.

The BJP described the results as a sign of things to come for the Congress’s new President. Home Minister Rajnath Singh, when asked about this being Rahul Gandhi’s first big political defeat after taking over as Congress President last week, said: “I don’t want to say too much. He has just taken over. Phir bhi, sir mudante hi ole pad gaye (Even then, this is a bit like Baptism by fire).”

The Congress, on the other hand, dubbed it as a launch pad for the party’s political revival. “We fought a good campaign and it will definitely get us results in future,” said Ashok Gehlot, former Rajasthan Chief Minister and senior leader who was in charge of Gujarat assembly elections. The Congress is hoping to do better in upcoming assembly elections next year in Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan.

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