Number Theory: Decoding BJP’s improved showing in state elections
The BJP’s record in the last two Lok Sabha elections continues to be better than its performance in state elections in most cases
Despite the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) victory in the recent state elections, there is one fact that remains unchanged in the party’s post-2014 story. The BJP’s record in the last two Lok Sabha elections continues to be better than its performance in state elections in most cases. For example, the 332 assembly constituencies (ACs) that the BJP won in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, and Chhattisgarh in the recent polls are still far less than the 444 and 450 AC-level leads it had in these states in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections. But this may not necessarily mean that the BJP’s improvement in Lok Sabha performance since 2014 has not added anything to its performance in state elections; after all, the BJP is part of 18 of 31 state and UT governments currently (with chief ministers in 12 of them). A long-term analysis of BJP’s state election performance suggests that it has, in fact, improved its performance in them after 2014. It is just that the improvement is not as significant as in the Lok Sabha elections.
