Summary:
Ahmedabad, Dec 8 (PTI) Counting of votes for a new assembly in Gujarat got underway Thursday, with early trends pointing to a sweeping victory for the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) that has not lost an election in the state since 1995.
The BJP was leading in 42 seats, while Congress was ahead in six and the AAP was winning four seats, according to early trends reported by the Election Commission.
Television channels, however, reported that BJP was ahead in more than 100 seats, the Congress in about 50 and the AAP was struggling to take its tally into double digits.
The results of the two-phase elections, held earlier this month, will be watched more for the performance of the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) that seem to be locked in a battle to grab the status of the main opposition party in the state.
While the Congress was not expected to replicate its creditable performance of the last Assembly elections in 2017, a good showing by AAP would have helped its leader Arvind Kejriwal cement his place as a key challenger to Prime Minister Narendra Modi in parliamentary elections due in 2024.
The Modi government is struggling with rising inflation, slowing growth and joblessness, but economic troubles are unlikely to dent BJP"s popularity in Gujarat that has been a bastion of the party for decades and where Modi was chief minister from 2001 to 2014.
Gujarat has 182 Assembly seats and the majority mark is 92.
Exit polls have predicted that the BJP will comfortably win a seventh straight term -- an outcome that will equal the Left Front"s feat in West Bengal.
If the BJP wins big in Gujarat and gets a majority in Himachal Pradesh, where votes were to be counted for elections held on Nov 12, it will be a huge morale boost for the party, said Sanjay Kumar at the New Delhi-based Centre for the Study of Developing Societies.
It will enthuse BJP"s rank and file, and reinforce the impression that the party will win the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, Kumar said.
For the Congress, its role as the main challenger to the BJP is at stake.
Thursday"s results will reveal if the party"s silent campaign has cut ice with people.
The party"s campaign, mostly shouldered by local leaders, has leaned on door-to-door canvassing for votes as its leader Rahul Gandhi, who had aggressively campaign in the 2017 elections, chose to stay away to focus on the Bharat Jodo Yatra.
For the AAP, which carried out a high-decibel campaign, the elections in Gujarat are an opportunity to establish itself as a pan-national party and a challenger to BJP at the national level.