The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of prime minister Narendra Modi on Thursday (8) secured a record victory in Gujarat, the PM's home state, where it was set to extend its rule to three decades after having nullified the challenges of opposition parties such as the Indian National Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
While political experts were analysing what helped the BJP kill an anti-incumbency wave and register such a landslide win, many felt the state's Muslim dominated-constituencies played a big role in the win of the Hindu right-wing party which did not field a single candidate from the minority community in the two-phase election held on December 1 and 5.
According to one analysis, the BJP appeared to win even in many Muslim-dominated seats at the expense of the Congress, which has traditionally won the support of the minority voters.
The BJP was leading in 12 of 17 seats in the state that have high Muslim population, an increase by five, compared to only five in which the secular Congress was leading, NDTV reported.
Historically, most of these seats have voted for the Congress.
In Dariapur constituency in Ahmedabad district in central Gujarat for example, the Congress's sitting candidate Giyasuddin Sheikh, who has been winning the seat for a decade, lost to the BJP's Kaushik Jain.
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which was confidently challenging the BJP in this election after tasting success in Punjab earlier this year, failed to register in any of the 16 Muslim-dominated constituencies where it contested from.
The party of Arvind Kejriwal, the chief minister of Delhi who has made several visits to Gujarat in the run-up to the elections and made several promises to the voters, contributed along with All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) of parliamentarian Asaduddin Owaisi towards splitting the minority votes that used to go to the Congress's kitty.
According to the NDTV report, the AIMIM fielded 13 candidates, including two non-Muslims, who ate into the Congress's assets in Muslim-dominated seats such as Jamalpur-Khadia in Ahmedabad district and Vadgam in Banaskantha district in north Gujarat. The Congress was trailing in both those seats.
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