Team Blitz India
BANGALURU: Karnataka elections rarely produce large majorities, particularly since the Bharatiya Janata Party became an important player in the state. With 135 seats and 43 per cent of the votes in the results announced on May 13, the Congress has won unequivocally with the largest vote- and seat-share since 1989.
Expectedly, the verdict has led to introspection in the BJP leadership over what went wrong, but the party is unfazed by the possibility of adverse effect of Karnataka on 2024 LS polls.
“The BJP won the 2019 Lok Sabha elections just after losing Assembly elections in Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, and Rajasthan in 2018. This indicates that the outcome of state elections does not necessarily determine the outcome of general elections,” a senior BJP leader said. Even though the Congress’ victory is a sweep, many seats remained locally competitive. Sixty-one seats were won with a margin of less than 5 pc.
The BJP maintained its 2018 voteshare, but lost a lot of seats. The Congress was able to surge ahead because of the substantial decline of the Janata Dal (Secular). After hovering between 18 pc and 20 pc of the votes in every election, the JD-S is down to 13.3 per cent this time.
In 2018, the BJP had emerged as the single-largest party in a hung state Assembly but the Congress-JD(S) coalition formed the government. In the LS elections that followed, the BJP and its allies were able to bag 26 of the 28 seats in Karnataka
