The Indian Express brings you real-time analysis of the results for the Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh Assembly elections.Gujarat, Himachal Assembly Election Result Highlights, Analysis: Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel tendered his resignation along with his entire cabinet on Friday to pave the way for formation of a new government in the state after the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) landslide victory in the Assembly elections. The BJP registered a historic victory in Gujarat by clinching 156 seats in the 182-member House. The Congress saw a dismal outcome in Gujarat, while the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has managed to gain a foothold in the state, and also garner enough votes to become a national party. The AAP story is consequential as it has dragged the Congress’s vote share to below 30 per cent for the first time in decades.
As the BJP registered a historic victory in Gujarat, Prime Minister Narendra Modi thanked the people of the state. “I bow before people, their blessings are overwhelming,” he said addressing BJP workers at the party headquarters in Delhi. Modi said the support to BJP shows that people’s anger against dynasty rule and corruption was rising, and added that no party has done as much as the BJP has for women. However, as the party will be thrown out of power by the Congress party in Himachal Pradesh, PM Modi said the BJP will keep working to fulfil the aspirations of the state. “I’m thankful to voters in Himachal also where our vote share was less than 1 per cent below that of winning party,” he said.
The Congress party is set to return to power in Himachal Pradesh, dislodging the BJP as it won 40 seats in the 68-member Assembly in the hill state which maintained its tradition of not voting any incumbent government to power since 1985. The win was much-needed for the otherwise deflated party. Meanwhile, the Congress has convened a meeting of all its newly-elected MLAs in Shimla on Friday where a resolution is likely to be passed authorising the party president to pick the next chief minister. Two party observers — Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel and senior leader from Haryana Bhupinder Singh Hooda — along with AICC in-charge for Himachal Pradesh Rajeev Shukla arrived in the state capital. Deciding on the chief ministerial face who can bind the party going forward is the immediate challenge for the Congress. State party president Pratibha Singh is considered a key frontrunner for the chief minister’s post, closely followed by former party chief Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu and outgoing CLP leader Mukesh Agnihotri.
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BJP supporters wait to get a glimpse of PM Narendra Modi outside a polling booth in Gujarat's Ranip on Monday during the state elections. (Express photo by Nirmal Harindran)
The lone Muslim face in the newly-elected 182-member 15th Gujarat Assembly is the sitting Congress MLA from Ahmedabad’s Jamalpur-Khadia, Imran Khedawala, who has been re-elected from the constituency with a margin of 13,658 votes.
The Muslim community makes up 9.67 per cent of Gujarat’s population. There were three Muslim MLAs, all from the Congress, in the 14th Gujarat Assembly.
The lack of representation of Muslims in the legislatures is not limited to Gujarat or just the BJP-ruled states.
Currently, there are 26 Muslims among the total 543 MPs in the Lok Sabha — making their representation 4.78 per cent, against 14.7 per cent share in the country’s population. -- writes Zeeshan Shaikh
A day after winning the election from Morbi Assembly seat, BJP leader Kantilal Amrutiya (second from right), performs a havan -- a ritual for the peace of souls of 135 killed in Jhulto Pul bridge collapse -- at Machhomata temple on the banks of Machchhu river, in Morbi on Friday. Amrutiya had himself jumped into the river to rescue people after the historic cable-stayed bridge collapsed on October 30 this year. (Express photo/Ravi Motwani)
Of the 45 new candidates fielded by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the Gujarat Assembly elections by dropping the sitting MLAs, all but two sailed through. In a bid to nullify anti-incumbency sentiment, the ruling party dropped 45 MLAs including former chief minister Vijay Rupani. The saffron party is in power in Gujarat for 27 years.
The strategy paid off as most of its new candidates won the election. The exceptions were Botad and Waghodia where new BJP candidates were defeated by their Aam Aadmi Party and independent rivals, respectively.
In Botad, the BJP had dropped sitting MLA and former energy minister Saurabh Patel and fielded Ghanshyam Virani. Patel had won the seat in 1998, 2002, 2007 and 2017. In 2012, the BJP's T D Maniya had won the seat.
In a major upset this time, Virani was defeated by AAP's Umesh Makwana with a thin margin of 2,779 votes. (PTI)
Aam Aadmi Party Gujarat state president Gopal Italia expressed his gratitude to the people of the state for electing five MLAs from the party and requested the victorious Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to not indulge in "paper leaks, corruption, and autocracy".
Italia who lost from the Katargam seat told mediapersons in Surat Thursday that the party is now preparing to "struggle and fight". "To work for the people, a lot of struggle is required. And I will do it." said Italia congratulating the BJP on its win.
"I am very happy, and those people who used to say that in the legislative assembly (of Gujarat) that a third party won't work, in their presence five MLAs of AAP will sit. So, I feel good, I am enjoying it," stated the state AAP president.
Italia was the party's candidate from Katargam in Surat district, and lost to BJP candidate Vinod Moradiya by 31.24% votes, and finished at the second place. (ENS)
The BJP’s landslide victory in Gujarat poses another existential crisis for the Congress. With the party reduced to 17 seats in a House of 182, with the BJP winning 156, the Congress now faces the risk of losing the post of Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Assembly.
On Thursday, replying to a question on what if the Congress did not get 10 per cent of the total seats in the Assembly, Gujarat BJP chief C R Paatil said, “Then its right to be the opposition party will be taken away.”
A senior officer of the Gujarat Assembly, who wished to remain anonymous, said, “There is no codified rule in the Gujarat Assembly on granting the status of LoP. However, a norm is being followed by the Speaker since 1960, according to which any party that gets a minimum of 10 per cent of the total seats, gets recognised as an opposition party.” The Congress is one short of the 10% mark, at 18 seats.
“In case opposition parties individually fail to get 10 per cent of the total seats, it is left to the Speaker on whether to grant the status to the largest opposition party or not,” the officer added. As per the prevailing norms, the Congress is one seat short of getting formally recognised as an opposition party in the state Assembly. -- writes Parimal A Dabhi
The promise of grant of tribal status to Hattees appears to have not helped the BJP in Himachal, with the Congress's Harshwardhan Chauhan defeating the BJP's Baldev Tomar in Shillai in Sirmour district, albeit with a thin margin of 382 votes. The BJP had been very confident of Tomar, considered close to outgoing Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur, winning.
During the campaign, Union Home Minister Amit Shah had himself assured that the Union government would soon give tribal status to the Hattees of the district, and that the Cabinet had already passed a proposal of this effect. Chauhan kept telling voters that the BJP was misleading the people and that there was no notification on grant of tribal status yet.
If the BJP was unable to convince the Hattees, the SCs appear to have turned away from the party, fearing that a possible tribal status to the district would hurt their rights.
It was Chauhan's sixth win from Shillai. -- writes Om Prakash Thakur
Pathan Emtiazkhan Sidkhan, JD(U)'s candidate from Bapunagar seat in Ahmedabad, had the misfortune of polling just 30 votes, the lowest by any contestant in the just-concluded Gujarat assembly elections. The 45-year-old, however, sought to put the blame on his party for not campaigning for him. "I would have got more votes had I contested as an independent candidate," he said.
Pathan is not new to politics. He had earlier tried his luck in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections from Kheda constituency in Gujarat and, according to him, he had got over 5,000 votes.
"I was an independent candidate then. But who knows JD(U) here? No one. This was bound to happen," he said, adding that the party gave tickets to about half a dozen candidates and all lost. The votes Pathan got were the lowest among the 1,621 candidates who contested for a total of 182 seats in the state.
A key witness of the Gulberg society massacre during the 2002 Gujarat riots, Pathan said that after the 2019 elections, he joined Asaduddin Owaisi's All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) and remained a member for two years. (PTI)
The verdict on December 8, 2022, has given a fillip to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the battle that lies ahead in 2024.
With a historic win in his home state Gujarat, his position is even more invincible. Just a division of the Opposition votes doesn’t explain the surge — the BJP won more seats by getting more than 50% of the votes (53%), upping its vote share by 4%, despite being in power for 27 long years. That’s no mean achievement — and calls for deeper study.
But the 2022 story isn’t so much about the BJP. It was expected to retain Gujarat and the Prime Minister pulled out all the stops. The story is more about the caving-in of the Congress in another big state of India — and, by so doing, strengthening the BJP on the road to 2024.
It is hardly a secret that when the Congress has lost big states – Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, or Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, in what was a unified Andhra Pradesh, which catapulted the party to power in 2004 — it has not been able to regain any. -- writes Neerja Chowdhury
For the Congress, more than issues that the BJP attacked it for — Medha Patkar joining the Bharat Jodo Yatra, or the “aukat” and “Raavan” remarks by its leaders against Prime Minister Narendra Modi, among others — it was the perception that the “Congress MLA is an easy defector” that sealed the party’s fate, say Congress leaders.
As the party nursed the wounds after its worst defeat, and stared at a bleak future in Gujarat, finishing with just 17 seats and a vote share of 27%, Congress general secretary in charge of the state, Raghu Sharma, resigned on Thursday even as the results came in.
“We lost the confidence of the voter, who was not sure that if he or she voted for our candidate, whether the latter would stay with the party,” said a national Congress leader.
This perception was reinforced by Arvind Kejriwal, who kept emphasising in his campaign that a vote to the Congress is a vote “wasted” — that a Congress MLA, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief maintained, would eventually join BJP. -- Leena Misra & Ritu Sharma write
The Opposition reacted sharply to the BJP’s win in Gujarat, saying the “victory was a confirmation of the deep communal polarisation that has been engineered by the BJP-RSS” and that the saffron party funded “the AAP to divide the Congress votes” in the state.
In its official statement on the results Thursday, The CPI(M) called “the BJP’s seventh successive victory” in Gujarat “a confirmation of the deep communal polarisation that has been engineered by the BJP-RSS over the last three decades”. “The projection of a pan-Hindu identity along with the rhetoric about Gujarati pride have overcome the more vital issues like price rise, unemployment and poor public health and educational facilities,” it said.
Talking to reporters after the results, Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole alleged that the BJP used “liquor and money” in the Gujarat elections, adding that “the BJP misused all institutions including the Enforcement Directorate, Central Bureau of Investigation and Election Commission to win the polls.”
"There is no BJP wave in the country. The people are fed up with BJP’s politics of hatred, declining economy, inflation and unemployment and the same is reflected in these results,” the Maharashtra Congress chief said. Read More
The Congress party, which suffered its worst-ever debacle in the Gujarat elections, managed to put its act together for the Himachal Pradesh Assembly polls and wrested the hill state from the BJP.
Although the Himachal polls was a close contest between the two contenders, in the end the challenger Congress got the better of the incumbent BJP decisively, bagging 40 of the total 68 seats as against the BJP’s 25.
So what worked for the Congress in the Himachal elections that did not in the Gujarat fray.
Firstly, the party started gearing up for the Himachal polls several months in advance. Despite being plagued by factionalism and infighting, the party’s state unit made efforts to put its house in order with different faction leaders coming together to put up a united face against the BJP. -- writes Amil Bhatnagar
Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel tendered his resignation along with his entire cabinet on Friday to pave the way for formation of a new government in the state after the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) landslide victory in the Assembly elections. The BJP registered a historic victory in Gujarat by clinching 156 seats in the 182-member House.
Patel, accompanied by Gujarat BJP chief C R Paatil and party's chief whip Pankaj Desai, handed over his resignation to Governor Acharya Devvrat at the Raj Bhavan in Gandhinagar. This is just a formality as the party has already announced that Patel will be the next chief minister of the state ahead of the polls. On Thursday, the state BJP chief had once again announced the Patel would continue to occupy the top post in the state and his swearing-in ceremony would be held on December 12. (PTI)
Rebels played a spoilsport for both the BJP and Congress in 12 out of the 68 assembly segments in Himachal Pradesh.
The rebels, who contested as independents in the assembly polls, marred the prospects of BJP candidates in eight seats while Congress candidates were hit in four assembly segments.
Out of the total 99 independents who were in the fray, 28 were rebels. All the three winning Independents -- K L Thakur from Nalagarh, Hoshiyar Singh from Dehra and Ashish Sharma from Hamirpur -- were BJP rebels who were denied party tickets.
Thakur had won in 2012 but lost in 2017 and the BJP chose to field Lakhwinder Singh Rana, a two-term Congress MLA, who jumped ship ahead of the elections.
Singh, sitting independent MLA from Dehra had joined the BJP on the eve of assembly elections but the party gave ticket to Ramesh Dhawala while Ashish Sharma from Hamirpur was also a BJP rebel. (PTI)
The BJP’s record-breaking victory in Gujarat illustrates the success of its booth micromanagement that complemented the popularity and the trust Prime Minister Narendra Modi enjoys among the electorate, while the absence of a similar strategy and organisational failure to effect timely changes cost it in Himachal Pradesh.
On the back of Modi’s intense campaign and a meticulously planned organisational strategy by Union Home Minister Amit Shah, the BJP won more than 150 seats in Gujarat, where it lost a few layers of sheen in 2017. This time, the BJP not only broke its personal best of 127 seats from the 2002 Assembly polls, which was held in the aftermath of the post-Godhra riots, it also eclipsed the Congress’s record of 149 seats from 1985 that came on the back of a sympathy wave created by Indira Gandhi’s assassination. Read more
Bucking the trend of incumbent agriculture ministers losing elections in successive BJP governments, Raghavji Patel, the agriculture minister in the outgoing Bhupendra Patel government managed to retain his seat of Jamnagar Rural in Jamnagar district on Thursday.
In the 2022 Assembly elections announced on Thursday, Raghavji defeated Prakash Donga, his main challenger from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) by 47,500 votes. Raghavji polled a total 79,439 votes while Donga managed to get only 31,939 votes. Kasam Khafi of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) was the second runner up with 29162 votes while Congress’ Jivan Kumbharvadiya managed to get only 18737 votes and came fourth.
With 105 new entrants, 14 women and one Muslim, in addition to the 77 sitting MLAs who have been re-elected, the 15th Legislative Assembly of Gujarat is all set to be a mix of fresh faces and experienced hands.
Among the new faces will be Rivaba Jadeja—a businesswoman and the wife of cricketer Ravindra Jadeja—who won from the Jamnagar North constituency by more than 50,000 votes. There were 13 women MLAs in the 14th Assembly, while the preceding Assembly had a record 17 women MLAs. Apart from Rivaba, there are two other businesswomen—Rita Patel and Malti Maheshwari. Rita is the newly elected BJP MLA from Gandhinagar North seat which covers the state’s capital. A builder by profession, she is the mayor of Gandhinagar Municipal Corporation. Maheshwari, who won from the Gandhidham seat, is into logistics business. Read more
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has won the Limkheda Assembly seat in Gujarat's Dahod district where 2002 riots victim Bilkis Bano once lived.
The candidate of the opposition Congress which had promised to revoke the remission granted by the BJP-led state government to 11 convicts in the Bilkis Bano gangrape case ended up third, polling 8,000 votes.
Bano was a resident of Randhikpur village in the tribal-dominated Dahod district.
Sitting BJP MLA Shailesh Bhabhor defeated his closest rival, Aam Aadmi Party's Naresh Baria by nearly 4,000 votes.
The premature release of 11 convicts in the Bilkis Bano case became an issue in the election campaign, with the Congress mentioning it in its manifesto and vowing to ensure justice for her.
Following the remission, the 11 men walked out of the Godhra sub-jail on August 15.
Some activists and observers had predicted that as the AAP leaders remained silent on the issue while Congress leaders like Jingnesh Mevani were vocal about it, Muslims would vote for the Congress.
But ahead of the polls, Shailesh Bhabhor had confidently claimed that Bilkis Bano was never a poll issue and even Muslims supported the BJP. (PTI)
The share of NOTA votes in the Gujarat Assembly elections fell by more than nine per cent from 2017, with the highest of 7,331 such votes polled in Khedbrahma seat this time.
According to Election Commission data, 5,01,202 or 1.5 per cent votes polled this election in the state were NOTA, down from 5,51,594 in the 2017 assembly elections.
The highest number of 7,331 NOTA votes were polled in Khedbrahma seat, followed by 5,213 in Danta and 5,093 in Chhota Udaipur.
The Devgadhbaria seat saw 4,821 NOTA votes, Shehra 4,708, Nizar 4,465, Bardoli 4,211, Daskroi 4,189, Dharamppur 4,189, Choryasi 4,169, Sankheda 4,143, Vadodara City 4,022 and Kaprada 4,020, among others.
The BJP bagged 156 seats in the 182-member Gujarat Assembly. It garnered a vote share of nearly 53 per cent, which was the highest for the party in the western state.
The BJP, which bagged 99 seats in the 2017 Assembly polls with a 49.1 per cent vote share, surpassed its previous best showing of 127 seats in 2002 when Narendra Modi was the chief minister. (PTI)
Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, a three-time MLA from Himachal Pradesh and the head of the Congress’s election committee, has emerged as a CM face in the state.
Like many other leaders, he began his career in student politics and rose to the position of state unit chief. With his comfortable victory from Nadaun, Sukhu is looking to cement his position in the highest post in the state
Originally from Nadaun in the Hamirpur district of the state, Sukhu obtained a degree in law. He joined the Congress’s student wing NSUI during his time in college. He was elected president of its state unit in 1989. Between 1998-2008, Sukhvinder also served as the president of the state youth Congress.
Sukhu was elected twice as Councilor of the municipal corporation of Shimla in the period between 1992 and 2002. After stints at the youth Congress, he became the secretary of the Pradesh Congress Committee in 2008. Sukhu was made president of the party largely owing to his party management skills and popularity.
Sukhu’s role in the party was evident as he headed the election campaign committee for the polls scheduled for later this year. Over a period of time, the 58-year-old leader has developed a support base among locals and within the party cadre.
After a successful campaign, Sukhu will be throwing the weight of his performance and his supporters in the CM race.
With Gujarat voting the BJP back for the seventh straight time, this election has made history in the state: it gave the party over 50 per cent of the popular vote and the highest seat tally in the House at 150 plus minus a ‘Hindutva wave’ but at the same time making room for a new political party in the Opposition space.
The key takeaways of the 2022 election are the formidable, undiminished sway Prime Minister Narendra Modi holds over his home state; the readiness of a section of the voters to accept an “outsider,” and the rejection of the fatigued Congress. Read more
The Congress MLAs will be gathering at the Rajiv Bhawan in Shimla at 3 pm. An all organisation meeting will be held in the presence of Chattisgarh CM Bhupesh Baghel, AICC in charge Rajiv Shukla and Haryana LoP Bhupinder Hooda.
With a comfortable majority, the party now seems confident and have summoned the legislators to state capital. A discussion on the CM face and the next strategy for cabinet will be held by senior leaders in consultation with the MLAs.
In a major setback to the BJP in Himachal Pradesh, eight ministers lost the assembly elections, results of which were declared on Thursday. The defeated leaders included Suresh Bhardwaj and Rakesh Pathania whose constituencies were changed from Shimla Urban and Nurpur to Kasumpti and Fatehpur respectively on the eve of the assembly polls and the outsider tag haunted them. The outgoing BJP government had 12 cabinet ministers, including Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur.
Anti-incumbency and non-governance weighed high on the minds of the voters and sitting ministers, including Govind Singh Thakur, Ram Lal Markanda, Rajinder Garg, Rajiv Sejal, Sarveen Chaudhary and Virender Kanwar also failed to win. Sitting Minister Mahender Singh vacated his seat, paving the way for political debut of his son Rajat Thakur, who also faced defeat. The hopes of three out of six chief minister aspirants from the Congress were also dashed. Six-time MLA Asha Kumari lost by a margin of 9,918 votes from Dalhousie. The move of the BJP to induct former chief minister Virbhadra Singh's aide Harsh Mahajan paid off in Dalhousie as Mahajan, son of former Congress stalwart and former Des Raj Mahajan, changed the equation in favour of BJP candidate D S Thakur due to his hold in the constituency. Former ministers Kaul Singh and Ram Lal Thakur lost by a narrow margin of 618 and 171 from Darang and Sri Naina Devi, respectively.
Congress candidate from Nahan Ajay Solanki emerged as a dark horse defeating former BJP state president Rajiv Bindal by 1,693 votes. Another winners who took many by surprise were BJP rebel Ashish Sharma from Hamirpur and BJP candidate from Bharmour Janak Raj who defeated former Congress minister Thakur Singh Bharmouri. Former Congress state president Kuldeep Rathore, who was facing rebellion from two Congress rebels Indu Verma, wife of former MLA Rakesh Verma, and Vijaypal Khachi, son of former Congress stalwart and former cabinet minister paved his way to victory in a multi-corner fight defeating the lone CPI(M) sitting MLA from Theog Rakesh Singha. (PTI)
Despite the ruling BJP's massive victory in Gujarat Assembly elections, seven of its sitting MLAs including a state minister lost on Thursday. Kirtisinh Vaghela, MLA from Kankrej seat in Banaskantha district and Minister of State for Primary, Secondary and Adult Education lost to the Congress' Amrutji Thakor, the brother of Gujarat Congress president Jagdish Thakor.
In an apparent move to nullify anti-incumbency sentiment, the BJP had denied tickets to nearly 40 of its sitting MLAs in these elections.
Former cabinet minister and sitting MLA from Chanasma seat in Patan district, Dilip Thakor, lost to the Congress's Dinesh Thakor by a thin margin of some 1,300 votes. Another former cabinet-rank minister Babu Bokhiria lost to his arch rival Arjun Modhwadia of the Congress from Porbandar. Raman Patel, MLA from Vijapur, and Mahesh Raval, sitting Khambhat MLA also lost to their Congress rivals. In a surprising result, six-time MLA from Gariadhar seat in Bhavnagar district, Keshu Nakrani, lost to the Aam Aadmi Party's (AAP) Sudhir Vaghani. Sitting BJP MLA from Waghodia seat Madhu Shrivastav, who stood as an independent candidate after being denied the party ticket, lost, coming in third.
Another independent candidate Dharmendrasinh Vaghela, also a BJP rebel, won from the seat while the BJP's official candidate Ashvin Patel came second. (PTI)
The two Assembly seats falling under the Lok Sabha constituency of state BJP president C R Paatil, Surat East and Limbayat, saw a tough contest. In Surat East, the BJP’s Arvind Rana and the Congress’s Aslam Cyclewala kept trading places till the 18th round, after which Rana won by over 14,000 votes. The Aam Aadmi Party had withdrawn from this seat, with over 92,000 Muslim voters, leaving the contest between the BJP, Congress and the AIMIM. Asaduddin Owaisi held three rallies in Surat in support of the party’s candidate.
Limbayat, a seat with a high migrant population and over 30% Muslim vote, had the highest number of candidates in the fray, 44. BJP candidate Sangita Patil and the Congress’s Gopal Patil similarly kept swapping the lead position here, before Sangita pulled ahead after the 15th round and won by a comfortable margin of 49,000-plus votes.
Of Limbayat’s 44 candidates, more than 30 were Muslim, almost all of them Independent. Confirming suspicions regarding the antecedents of these candidates, a majority of the Independents got less than 100 votes each. -- Kamal Saiyed writes
Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel, who is set to take oath for the second time on December 12, has broken his own 2017 record to win his seat, Ghatlodia, where he is leading by a margin of 1,70,276 votes and counting.
Five years ago, the Kadva Patidar BJP leader had won with the highest margin of 1,17,750 votes in the state, breaking the earlier record of his mentor and Uttar Pradesh governor Anandiben Patel, who had won by 1,10,395 votes from Ghatlodia. The Ghatlodia seat in Ahmedabad city has the highest number of voters in Gujarat.
Patel, who is a builder by profession, was brought in as CM in September last year, replacing Vijay Rupani in an audacious move where the BJP also brought in a brand new ministry.
Described by Prime Minister Narendra Modi as “mrudu ane makkam” (soft and firm), Patel is a man of few words, but has taken a firm stand when required. He walked into the CM office at a time when Rajkot and Jamnagar were reeling under floods, and even before his swearing-in, undertook an aerial survey of Jamnagar. But the roadblocks didn’t end there. The swearing-in ceremony of his new team, which was to be held the following day, had to be postponed, reportedly because of protests by certain ministers who were to be dropped. -- Parimal A Dabhi writes
Lok Sabha MP from Mandi Pratibha Singh was "hopeful" of the Congress victory in the Himachal Pradesh Assembly elections, and now she is a CM hopeful.
"(BJP president J P) Naddaji is from Himachal, (Union Minister) Anurag (Thakur) is from Himachal. It will be an election of prestige for them. And, you know, the BJP has the money power. They will put everything into the election. It is going to be a tough fight," she had told The Indian Express in an earlier interview.
As soon as the Assembly election results poured in on Thursday, Singh did not rule her out of the CM race. "Virbhadra has done so much for the party. His legacy and his family can't be ignored (while deciding the CM candidate)," she told The Indian Express. Hoping to ride on the popularity of her late husband, she believes "there is no leader of his stature in the state and there is no tall leader like him".
Interestingly, she had claimed "I am not cut out for politics. Given a choice, I would not have entered this field". However, she also finds nothing wrong in aspiring to get a post. "When someone becomes an MLA, he wants to become a minister. When someone becomes a minister, he wants to become a chief minister. Nothing wrong in that."
On the immediate challenge for the Congress, she said, "To deliver what we promised. The elected MLAs will sit down and we will chalk out the future road map." -- Rajesh Chander Sharma writes
A lone woman MLA will be a member of the 68-member Assembly in Himachal. BJP's Reena Kashyap has emerged as the sole female winner in the assembly elections. Kashyap beat Congress's Dayal Pyari who had rebelled and left the BJP earlier. The constituency Pachhad was the only seat that had two women candidates in the fray.
BJP district president Suresh Kashyap hails from the region and is considered to be a BJP strongman. Suresh Kashyap had won the seat in 2012 and 2017, but after he contested and won in the 2019 Lok Sabha election to become an MP, zila parishad member Dayal Payari was seen as the BJP frontrunner for the 2019 bye-election. She was denied the ticket by the camp of Suresh Kashyap and CM Jai Ram Thakur. When the BJP gave the ticket to Reena Kashyap, who was also a zila parishad member, Dayal Payari contested as an Independent.
Incumbent MLA and BJP candidate Reena Kashyap interacted with local SC communities to convince them that their rights would not be affected by the ST status of the Hattis. Kashyap focused on building trust within the SC and ST communities. (ENS)
The BJP’s record-breaking victory in Gujarat illustrates the success of its booth micromanagement that complemented the popularity and the trust Prime Minister Narendra Modi enjoys among the electorate, while the absence of a similar strategy and organisational failure to effect timely changes cost it in Himachal Pradesh.
On the back of Modi’s intense campaign and a meticulously planned organisational strategy by Union Home Minister Amit Shah, the BJP won more than 150 seats in Gujarat, where it lost a few layers of sheen in 2017. This time, the BJP not only broke its personal best of 127 seats from the 2002 Assembly polls, which was held in the aftermath of the post-Godhra riots, it also eclipsed the Congress’s record of 149 seats from 1985 that came on the back of a sympathy wave created by Indira Gandhi’s assassination.
This time, the BJP’s united and disciplined cadre and a robust organisation negated factors such as anti-incumbency, complacency, and fatigue. A senior party leader attributed the Gujarat victory to two factors. “Micromanagement is the BJP’s style. BJP always campaigns with full vigour. But in Gujarat what helped the BJP is the entry of the AAP into the political landscape of Gujarat, splitting the anti-BJP votes. Rahul Gandhi’s disengagement with the anti-BJP movement in the state and the local Congress leadership’s disinterest have just added to it.” -- Liz Mathew writes
Gurkirat Kotli, Congress affairs incharge in Himachal has said that the Congress legislative Party (CLP) is meeting in Shimla on Friday to finalise the chief minister. “Earlier, we had decided this meeting in Chandigarh but we have shifted the venue to Shimla. The CM’s named will be finalised after consultation with the high command,” he said.
Sources said AICC general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra was holding discussions on the issue and was taking keen interest. “The CM will be of Priyanka’s choice. She is on it. She has called several bio datas. She is going through them,” said a source. -- Kanchan Vasdev writes
As the Congress party touches 40 seats in Himachal Pradesh, the selection of a Chief Minister will be the next challenge. The party has been ridden with factionalism as several CM faces are pushing for representation at the highest post in the state.
Even though the Congress is well past the majority mark, the winning candidates have been called to Chandigarh for meetings and discussions. Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel and AICC in-charge Rajiv Shukla will be reaching Chandigarh in the evening. The candidates are likely to be placed at a hotel. As the rounds of counting progressed, Congress began deliberations on their next step. It was initially decided that senior leaders and candidates will reach Shimla. The plan was changed last minute and all movement was diverted toward Chandigarh. A hotel with at least 50 rooms is being arranged for the stay.
The apprehension of a horse-trading attempt by the BJP had been expressed by the party prior to the result as well.
Mukesh Agnihotri, a journalist turned politician and the leader of the Opposition, is the front-runner for the CM post. "The decision taken by the party will be the final decision. Winning is the most important aspect at the moment," Agnihotri told The Indian Express. Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, former HPCC chief, is also in the running for the post. -- Amil Bhatnagar writes
Speaking on the BJP government's achievements, Modi says "Our govt has worked to empower the poor and also to build modern infra in different sectors like road, rail and optical fibre."
"BJP is getting support from all sections of society, it has won 34 of 40 reserved seats for SC, ST in Gujarat polls," he said.
The results of Gujarat have proved how strong is the desire of the common man for a developed India, says Modi adding that the message is clear that whenever there is a challenge before the country, people show their faith in BJP.
Addressing party workers, Modi says Gujarat's love for the BJP despite the party being in power for 25 years is "unprecedented, they have broken all records and written history."
People voted for BJP as it is taking all facilities to the poor and middle class at the earliest, says Modi
BJP's win in Kurhani assembly bypoll in Bihar is an indication of times to come in state, says PM Modi while addressing BJP workers at party headquarters in Delhi.
Former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda Thursday welcomed the Himachal Pradesh election win of the Congress, saying: “Himachal is situated in the hills, at a height. If you give a call from the top, it goes everywhere. So, the mandate of Himachal would have an impact across the country.” Sources said Hooda, appointed observer by the Congress to oversee formation of government in the hill state, believes it is a plus that now all four states adjoining Haryana – Himachal, Rajasthan, Punjab and Delhi – are headed by non-BJP parties.
A senior Congress leader said: “The outcome of Gujarat was already well-known, but the Congress’s win in Himachal is important as it has defeated the ruling party.”
The Hooda camp is already on the upswing over his loyalists holding key posts in Haryana now, and several other poll developments. While the BJP won the Adampur by-election held in the state recently, it saw the consolidation of Jat vote behind the Congress’s Jai Prakash. On the other hand, in the zilla parishad ward polls, the BJP faced a jolt. -- Sukhbir Siwach writes
A key Himachal Pradesh district, Mandi has 10 Assembly constituencies, nine of which the BJP won in 2017, including the Seraj seat from where Jai Ram Thakur won to become the chief minister after projected CM Prem Kumar Dhumal lost from Sujanpur. On Thursday, Thakur won the Seraj seat yet again, with a margin of 38,183 votes, defeating Congress’s Chet Ram.
Battling anti-incumbency, the BJP replicated the result and won nine out of ten seats yet again. Mandi district is the second largest district in Himachal Pradesh with around 8.58 lakh voters.
The Congress’s lone seat was won in Dharampur by the Congress's Chander Shekhar. He defeated the BJP's Rajat Thakur with a narrow margin of 2,807 votes. -- Raakhi Jagga writes
Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi arrived in Jaipur Thursday, a day ahead of her birthday Friday.
From Jaipur, Sonia went to Sawai Madhopur where she will stay at Shergarh resort in Ranthambore. Her daughter and Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi also reached Ranthambore by road while Rahul Gandhi also took a break from Bharat Jodo Yatra and joined them Thursday.
Sonia Gandhi will be celebrating her birthday on December 9, Friday, in Sawai Madhopur, which will also be a break day for the Yatra.
On Thursday, the Yatra started from a temple a little after 6 am and halted at Kota’s Bhadana village around 11.30 am. As per the schedule, the yatris will stay for the night at Gurli village. Unlike other days, there was no Yatra Thursday evening with Friday being a rest day. (ENS)
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was leading in 5 seats in Gujarat after more than seven hours of counting of votes on December 8, but its vote-share was close to 13%, which meant it is on track to be recognised as a national party by the Election Commission of India (ECI).
The name suggests that a national party would be one that has a presence ‘nationally’, as opposed to a regional party whose presence is restricted to only a particular state or region.
National parties are usually India’s bigger parties, such as the Congress and BJP. However, some smaller parties, like the communist parties, are also recognised as national parties. A certain stature is sometimes associated with being a national party, but this does not necessarily translate into having a lot of national political clout. Read our explainer to know more
Former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda said Thursday that they would soon take a call on whether the meeting of the newly elected Congress MLAs of Himachal Pradesh would be held in Chandigarh or Shimla. The meeting will take place on Thursday or Friday. Hooda hinted that a decision regarding the place of meeting would be taken on Thursday evening itself.
Hooda and Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel have been nominated as observers for the formation of government in Himachal Pradesh. Another Congress leader Rajeev Shukla is the All India Congress Committee in-charge for Himachal Pradesh. Party sources say the trio on Thursday evening will take a call regarding the venue of the meeting of the legislators.
With initial trends of poll results on Thursday morning showing a possible neck-and-neck contest between BJP and Congress in Himachal, there were speculations that the Congress MLAs may be brought to Chandigarh to ensure they are not wooed by the political opponents to turn them into a rebellion. However, finally, the Congress has succeeded to gain a majority in the state. But still, sources in Congress says, the Congress leadership is alert about the possibility of any type of “horse trading”.
When asked about the venue of the MLAs’ meeting, Bhupinder Singh Hooda said: “We will take a call whether to hold the meeting in Chandigarh or Shimla while keeping in view the convenience of the MLAs. We don’t have any programme to take them to Congress ruled Chhattisgarh. The people have given us a clear majority in Himachal Pradesh and we will form the government there. Horse trading is done by the BJP.”
When asked about the debacle of the Congress in Gujarat, Hooda said: “We accept the mandate of the people. BJP have lost in byelections at all places. The vote katu party (AAP) stands exposed. Wherever, the AAP contests elections, it has only aim to cut the votes of Congress. AAP was claiming to form a government in Gujarat. But ultimately it was reduced to cut the votes of Congress only. In Adampur by poll, the AAP candidate secured just nearly 3,000 votes. But whatever votes they get, they cut the votes of Congress. The people have recognised them.” -- Sukhbir Siwach writes
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Thursday thanked the people of Himachal Pradesh for the "decisive win" of his party in the hill state and assured them that every promise made by the party will be fulfilled. "Heartfelt thanks to the people of Himachal Pradesh for this decisive victory. Hearty congratulations to all Congress workers and leaders. Your hard work and dedication really deserve all the credit for this victory," Gandhi said in a tweet in Hindi.
"I assure you again, every promise made to the people will be fulfilled at the earliest," the former Congress chief said.
The Congress had promised to bring back the old pension scheme and provide jobs to the youth among other things in its campaign in the hill state. (PTI)
With the BJP headed for a memorable victory in Gujarat, Prime Minister Narendra Modi Thursday took to the twitter to thank the voters in the state. "Thank you Gujarat. I am overcome with a lot of emotions seeing the phenomenal election results. People blessed politics of development and at the same time expressed a desire that they want this momentum to continue at a greater pace. I bow to Gujarat’s Jan Shakti," he said.
In another tweet, Modi congratulated the BJP workers saying "This historic win would never be possible without the exceptional hardwork of our Karyakartas, who are the real strength of our party."
With the BJP poised for a defeat in Himachal Pradesh, PM Modi said, "I thank the people of Himachal Pradesh for the affection and support for the BJP. We will keep working to fulfil the aspirations of the state and raise people’s issues in the times to come."
Mohan Konkani, the first Christian candidate fielded by the BJP in Gujarat in 20 years, won from the Vyara tribal seat in Tapi district, defeating four-time Congress MLA Punabhai Gamit, who was pushed to the third position due to an impressive show put up by new entrant the Aam Aadmi Party. Konkani won by an impressive 22,670 votes.
The Vyara seat, which gave Gujarat its first tribal chief minister Amarsinh Chaudhary, for the first time witnessed a contest between two Christian candidates, fielded by the BJP and the Congress. Gamit, the sitting MLA, had won the Assembly polls four times in a row starting from a bye-election in 2004. He was banking on the works he did in his constituency as an MLA and the traditional support that the party enjoyed in the region, while the BJP highlighted the development projects by the ruling party in the eastern belt of Gujarat.
The AAP's entry is believed to have damaged Gamit's prospects.
Of the total 2.20 lakh voters from the seat, a sizable 40,000 are Christians. (ENS)
Minutes after the Election Commission started releasing the Gujarat trends Thursday morning, large banners came up outside the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) Delhi headquarters, announcing that the party, formed in 2012 on the back of a powerful anti-corruption movement, has turned “national”.
But attaining national status was the least that the AAP was hoping to achieve after having led an aggressive campaign in Gujarat, where electoral contests have been bipolar in nature ever since the formation of the state in 1960.
Led by Delhi Chief Minister and the party’s national convener Arvind Kejriwal, the AAP launched its Gujarat campaign last April, and over the subsequent months, led a spirited campaign, also helped to a large extent by the moribund state of the principal opposition party, the Congress. -- Sourav Roy Barman writes
Even as the Congress looks all set to form the next government in Himachal Pradesh, the party’s six-time MLA Asha Kumari faced a massive drubbing from Dalhousie, trailing by over 9,700 votes against BJP’s Dhavinder Singh Thakur, till the filing of this report.
Kumari, better known as ‘Asha Rani’ in her constituency, was among the top contenders for the CM’s post in the hill state, but now even as the Congress is inching towards the magic number to form the government in the state, she is out of the race for the top post following her massive defeat from Dalhousie constituency of Chamba district.
From tribal constituency Bharmour, BJP’s first-timer Dr Janak Raj (43), a neurosurgeon who resigned from his government job to contest elections, has defeated Thakur Singh Bharmouri (75), five-time MLA and former Congress minister, by 5,172 votes. Both are from Gaddi community and belong to the same clan. From this seat, BJP had dropped its sitting MLA Jiya Lal Kapoor and given a ticket to fresh face Dr Janak Raj. -- Divya Goyal writes
It was a battle between tradition and ambition. Traditionally, Himachal Pradesh has never repeated a government in power in the last 37 years. The pragmatic Himachali voter has always thought it best not to let any party get too comfortable in the seat. Even in the run-up to these elections, this sentiment was evident on the ground – “Inhein dekh liya, ab Congress ko chance dete hain (We have seen them, now let’s see the others”). But this time, equally strong was the BJP’s call for changing the “riwaaz (tradition)”.
The winds of change were evident since the October 2021 bypolls when the Congress won all the four seats. But many thought the BJP had a real chance, given that the Congress had lost its mascot, six-time chief minister Virbhadra Singh in 2021, and that it was in shambles at the Centre. The BJP also had a trump card in Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whose popularity seemed to cut across party lines in the state.
The party then proceeded to give the election its all, with BJP president J P Nadda making it a matter of his personal prestige, Union ministers Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh and Smriti Irani coming to campaign, and Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath addressing a series of rallies, all reinforcing the message of “double engine sarkaar”. The BJP also tried to nip anti-incumbency by dropping 11 of its 44 MLAs.
What the party did not account for was the full-scale rebellion that ensued. Many of the rebels could not be pacified and this is believed to have eventually cost the party at least 10-odd seats – a crucial difference that may have caused it power. Three of their rebels, who were clearly front-runners right from the beginning, managed to win their seats. -- Manraj Grewal Sharma writes
With the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) set to form government in Gujarat once again, state BJP president C R Paatil Thursday declared that Bhupendra Patel will be sworn in as next Chief Minister of Gujarat. The swearing in ceremony will be held at Helipad ground inside New Secretariat complex in the state capital on December 12 and will be attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
Addressing a press conference after the party's resounding victory in the Assembly elections, Paatil thanked the people of Gujarat and termed PM Modi as the 'sculptor' of the historic victory.
CM Bhupendra Patel was also present at the press conference. Referring to the election results, the CM said, "The people of Gujarat have once again negated the anti- national elements while giving nationalists the opportunity to serve them." Parimal A Dhabi writes
Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur may have won his seat with an impressive margin — he got almost 76% of the vote — but many in the BJP attribute the party’s failure to win in Himachal Pradesh again to his style of functioning.
The BJP also seems to have been thwarted by the strong yearning for change in the hill state, which switches between the BJP and Congress in every election, party sources said.
At 12.45 pm, the Congress, battered by an endless series of electoral setbacks around the country, was seen to be winning 39 seats, a clear majority in the 68-member Assembly while the BJP had come down from its tally of 44 to 26.
If the trends turn out to be results, it will be seen as the reflection of a sentiment against the BJP in the state and the yearning for change across the state. Political observers who kept their eyes on the political developments in Himachal Pradesh said the Congress campaign, with emphasis on the local issues and the local leadership, has paid off well. Read our explainer
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has started celebrating as the party is set to gain the status of a national party, as counting of votes continues in Gujarat. However, the party is disappointed about not getting anywhere near to the expected number of seats.
“We are quite disappointed as we were expecting 40-50 seats with our active presence in the state for the last 8 months. Getting 5-10 seats was definitely not what we expected,” said DK Tiwari, Vice President of the trade wing of AAP Gujarat.
Tiwari gives two reasons for this: “Firstly, not many people come out to vote. Especially the young voters aged between 20-40 years. That’s a major setback. Secondly, of the people who vote, about 75 per cent of them are from those strata of the society who were manipulated at the last hour.”
He also reasoned that since the party was new they could not win the trust of their voters as much as they expected. “However, it is important to note that we have got votes in all the seats from where our candidates were fielded. Also, our vote share is commendable which is around 15-20 per cent. And most importantly, we are now a national party,” said Tiwari, emphasising on the party’s target on 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
With a victory enroute, Congress party has begun mulling over the next steps. As per party sources, the winning candidates are being moved to Chandigarh, where senior leaders including Rajiv Shukla and Bhupesh Baghel are expected to reach as well.
In the run up to the polls, the party feared that there might be poaching attempts by BJP and the Congress do not want to take any risk. With several faces contending for the chief ministerial post, the next step for the Congress is to remain united. -- Amil Bhatnagar writes
In a complete reversal of the 2017 decision, Congress is likely to be completely routed in the Saurashtra-Kutch region, with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) set to sweep more than 40 of the 54 seats in the agrarian region, trends of the Assembly election show. After a listless campaign, Congress isfacing the prospect of being overtaken by the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) as the main challenger to the saffron party.
The ruling party is set for victories in all eight seats in Rajkot district, six in Bhavnagar district, five in Kutch district, four each in Surendranagar, Gir Somnath and Jamnagar districts, three each in Morbi, Junagadh and Amreli districts and one in Botad. Hurt, in parts by AAP, Congress, which had won 30 out of 54 seats in 2017, is fencing victories only in Porbandar in Porbandar district, Manavadar in Junagadh, Abdasa seat and in Kutch district and was leading in Savarkundla seat in Amreli district.
On the other hand, AAP was set to upset BJP and Congress candidates in Gariadhar seat in Bhavnagar, Visavadar in Junagadh, Botad, Jamjodhpur in Jamnagar and Chotila in Surendranagar. However, AAP’s chief ministerial face, Isudan Gadhvi was staring at defeat in Khambhalia seat in Devbhumi Dwarka district. -- Gopal B Kateshiya writes
With the BJP set for a massive win in Gujarat, AAP creating inroads and the Congress looking to return to power in Himachal Pradesh, our political editors break down the results for you.
Now that it looks set to form the government in Himachal Pradesh, the Congress might face the problem of plenty, with several chief minister contenders in the fray.
The three considered ahead of others in the race are Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu, Mukesh Agnihotri and Pratibha Singh. While Singh is a sitting MP and did not contest, Sukhu and Agnihotri were on course to winning their seats. Read more
The Jhulto Pul suspension bridge tragedy which left 135 people dead in Morbi town on October 30 seems to have little effect on the outcome of the Assembly election for the seat, as early trends suggest the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is set to wrest the Morbi Assembly constituency back from Congress after five years.
Halfway through the counting of votes, BJP’s Kantilal Amrutiya was leading his Congress rival Jayantilal Patel by 22,489 votes in the Morbi Assembly seat. Read more
At 12.30 pm on Thursday (December 8), the Congress had opened up a significant advantage over the BJP in Himachal Pradesh, with leads in 40 of the 68 seats. If this situation holds, the Congress will have a clear majority in the Assembly.
The BJP had won one seat and was leading in another 24. Independent candidates were leading in 3 seats.
The trends indicated that Himachal Pradesh had chosen to stay with the tradition of alternate Congress and BJP governments, which has been the pattern since 1985. Read Manraj Grewal Sharma's explainer on why voters are leaning towards the party.
Congress is set to sweep Himachal's apple belt, with seven out of eight Congress candidates leading on their seats. The only BJP candidate leading in the area is Balbir Singh Verma from Chopal. In Theog, the CPI (M) incumbent Rakesh Singha, is in the third position at present. -- Mallica Joshi writes
The Congress should perhaps blame no one else but itself for its spectacular fall in the Gujarat Assembly polls. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which entered the race amid fanfare, has managed to walk away with a significant vote share and seems to have contributed heavily to the Congress’s decimation.
The BJP has increased its already formidable vote base and it is the Congress vote share which has plummeted below 25 per cent. The Congress’s campaign narrative in Gujarat was not convincing, too.
In sharp contrast, the Congress’s story in Himachal Pradesh was entirely different. Regardless of the outcome in the Himachal polls, which turned out to be a neck-and-neck race with the Congress eventually getting ahead of the incumbent BJP, the grand old party’s campaign was much better in the hill state. Read Manoj C G's analysis here
Mandi district has 10 Assembly constituencies, nine of which the BJP had won in 2017, including Jai Ram Thakur from Seraj, who became the Chief Minister after the projected CM, Prem Kumar Dhumal, lost from Sujanpur. Jai Ram has won this seat again with a margin of more than 20,000 votes defeating Congress's Chet Ram.
Despite Jai Ram being BJP's projected CM in this election, the party had faced anti-incumbency on many seats in the district.
This is the second largest district of Himachal Pradesh. Out of the ten Mandi seats, BJP has already won three seats. While Jai Ram Thakur had a thumping victory from Seraj, BJP's Anil Sharma won from Mandi defeating Congress's Champa Thakur by 8,970 votes. BJP's Rakesh Jamwal won from Sundernagar defeating Congress's Sohan Lal by 8,125 votes. The party is leading on six more seats while Congress is leading on Sarkaghat constituency of this district. Former Congress PCC president Kaul Singh Thakur, a CM contender, is also trailing from Darang.
Though Jai Ram Thakur boasts of starting the Atal Medical and Research University in Mandi, and of launching the construction of Shiv Dham, a religious-cum-tourism centre that's yet to be completed, locals were miffed with poor parking arrangements in most constituencies. Bad roads, not only in Mandi but in other districts as well, painted a poor picture of the BJP government, which was also blamed for not doing much about the rehabilitation of people who were displaced by projects to widen national highways into four lanes.
So far, newcomer AAP is having little impact as all the candidates are set to lose their security deposits. -- Raakhi Jagga writes
As the Gujarat election results indicate a setback for Congress in the state, the Gujarat Pradesh Congress Committee (GPCC) president Jagdish Thakor at state headquarters in Ahmedabad, Rajiv Gandhi Bhavan said the results are "shocking".
"The decision of Gujarat people to make BJP government and the way results are pouring in looks like they were no shortcomings of ours but despite that these results are shocking," Thakor said.
Adding that in the end in democracy peoples' vote is important, Thakor said, "Congress fought hard. But even then we failed in making the government. These results are indicating that. I congratulate those who are going to form the government."
On the reasons for the lowest vote share of Congress Thakor said, "These would be discussed. There are not one or two reasons for a loss or victory in the elections. Also it is not the case that there is love for BJP."
Congress stalwarts like Leader of Opposition Sukhram Rathwa, former LoP Paresh Dhanani are set to lose to the BJP, in what looked like a fragmentation of votes between the Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the fight getting tough for second place on these seats.
The fight remains close for Gujarat Pradesh Congress Committee president Amit Chavda, cousin of former union minister Bharatsinh Solanki, even as Jignesh Mevani is trailing closely behind BJP candidate Manilal Vaghela on the Vadgam seat.
On the ST reserved Jetpur seat, BJP’s Jayanti Rathwa has gotten 30,950 votes while Sukhram has gotten 13,011 votes and the AAP’s Radhika Rathwa has gotten 11,899 votes.
On the Amreli seat of Saurashtra, where Dhanani had won for the first time even during the Hindutva wave of 2002, Congress is losing to BJP’s Kaushik Vekarya with the AAP at a close third.
Vekarya is leading with 23,199 votes, while AAP’s Ravi Dhanani got 11,697 votes and Dhanani had got 12,077 votes as counting continues. All candidates on Amreli seat are Patidars.
On the Anklav seat, the fight is neck and neck between Congress’s Amit Chavda (53,597 votes) and BJP’s Gulabsinh Padhiyar (54,411 votes) with AAP far behind at 1,260. The NOTA votes on this seat were higher than AAP at 1,842.
On the Vadgam SC reserved seat, Mevani at 28,594 votes saw a close fight with Vaghela at 31,060 votes. Vaghela who had won the seat in 2012 as a Congress candidate had vacated it in 2017 in favour of Mevani who was contesting as an Independent with support of the Congress. Vaghela then defected to the BJP. -- Leena Misra writes