Finally, the Election Commissioner of India declared dates for the Gujarat assembly election 2022, according to which the voting will be done in two phases on dates 1st and 5th of December 2022 respectively. Counting will be done on 8th December 2022. The Gujarat Assembly election result is very important in Indian polity as both Prime Minister and Home Minister are from this state. That’s why the political circle, as well as many intellectuals and even common men, generate a lot of interest in the entire electoral politics of this state. Many think that this Gujarat Assembly Election will have a deep influence on the upcoming general election of 2024. However, my experience says that state assembly elections especially in this present era don’t have any effect on the general elections because nowadays public/voters are mature and smart. They vote differently for state assembly elections and for parliamentary elections.
Anyway, like all other elections, I am here with a pre-election analysis starting from the electoral history to recent opinion polls to have a sense of present Gujarat polity. I have compiled vote share and seats won since the 1995 assembly election as below. The reason why I compiled since 1995 is that the BJP and Congress two-party rivalry started in the 1995 assembly election. Before that in 1990 there were three parties such as BJP, Janata Dal, and Congress, In 1985 and 1980 also there were three parties such as Janata Party, BJP, and Congress. In 1995 both Janata Party and its splitting party Janata Dal wiped out. That’s why I have considered the electoral history from the 1995 election.
Source- Wikipedia
If you deeply study the table, you will find that BJP is continuously in the government since 1995 or say for the last 27 years. That means around 30 to 40% of the voters who are young may not have seen any other party’s rule in this state. The next point to note is that Congress’s vote share is increasing continuously except in the 2002 and 2007 elections. 2002 was a highly polarised polity whereas in 2007 Narendra Modi already established his persona and thus that election was pro-incumbency. But despite Narendra Modi being at the helm, in 2012, the BJP’s vote share dropped although marginally but Congress benefitted in increasing the number of seats. In fact, except in the 2002 election, Congress’s vote share as well as the number of seats increased as the difference in vote share between BJP and Congress decreased. In 2017 BJP secured around 49.05% but its seats were reduced to 99 because Congress’s vote share increased up to 41.44%. Many experts at that time were of the opinion that Congress really had a golden chance to defeat BJP in 2017. There were some gaffes by Congress that helped BJP to somehow win that election. Had Mani Shankar Ayer didn’t attack Narendra Modi with derogatory comments and had Narendra Modi personally not managed the election campaign, Congress would have won that election.
Anyway, what’s the current political environment of Gujarat? After Narendra Modi, I don’t think any Chief Minister of Gujarat has any popularity that they can win the election on their own. Anandi Ben was replaced by Vijay Rupani before the 2017 election and now Bhupendra Bhai Patel is the Chief Minister who belongs to the Patil community but is not endorsed by everyone. Then 27 years of anti-incumbency is too big. So, common sense says this is Congress’s time to win this election.
But the question is where is Congress in Gujarat? Many have quit the party, The organization took a big hit because that’s run by old and veteran leaders who don’t have a direct connection to the mass and ground-level workers. In my opinion, Congress is gradually reducing its footprint in states like Gujarat. Will that benefit BJP?
But before coming to BJP, let’s talk about AAP. AAP had around 0.1% vote share in the 2017 assembly election. But this time it made some inroads into Gujarat polity especially grabbing the Congress space. At least in urban areas, Congress already ceded its vote base (which is anti-BJP) to AAP. AAP might have some issues in obtaining Congress’s rural space but AAP is rising in this state at the cost of Congress. Will AAP win this election?
I don’t think so. According to me, BJP will be benefited from AAP’s rise at the cost of Congress’s voter base. In fact, there’s every likelihood that anti-BJP votes will split so, with even a reduced vote share BJP will retain power.
Let’s go to opinion polls.
According to the ABP-C-Voter opinion poll of 4th November, 2022 BJP will get 45.4% whereas Congress and AAP will get 29.1% and 20.2% respectively. This is also going to change if we compare the same ABP-C-Voter opinion dated 2nd October 2022 where it predicted a vote share for BJP, Congress, and AAP as 46.8%, 32.3%, and 17.4%. That means in a month’s time BJP lost 1% vote share and Congress around 2% of the vote share and this combined 3% vote share is added to AAP’s vote share. So, according to me, BJP may end up with a 42-44 % vote share whereas Congress and AAP may have a 25% vote share each by the time of voting. That means BJP will win it big because, despite reduced vote share, the difference in vote share will increase its number of seats.
On the other hand, the IndiaTV-Martize opinion poll on 4th November 2022 shows that BJP will secure 51.3% vote share whereas Congress and AAP will secure 37.2% and 7.2% vote share respectively. That means according to this opinion poll, AAP is not able to grab Congress vote share in a big way although it actually dents any chance for Congress winning the election.
Both pollsters’ data actually not matching to each other. But I don’t question anyone’s credibility. Rather I agree with the conclusion of both pollsters that despite 27 years of incumbency, BJP will retain power in Gujarat and for this win of the BJP, it should thank AAP.