Refuting the claims made by Congress leader Jairam Ramesh on December 10 that it was parties like AAP and AIMIM’s (All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen) objective to cut down the vote share which impacted Congress, MP Asaduddin Owaisi, on Sunday, tweeted that the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Hindu vote bank had increased since 2017.
Sharing an article from The Hindu, Assaduddin tweeted, “Gujarat election data makes it clear that not only did every section of Hindu society vote for BJP but that their vote-share actually INCREASED from 2017. Today, in Gujarat, the majority community is Modi’s A-Z team. What will Congress & other ‘secular’ parties do now?”
The article talks about how the BJP successfully knitted a vote bank by planting candidates of the same communities and thus uniting all Hindu sections in Gujarat, a feat it had failed back in 2017.
“As the post-poll survey indicates, OBCs, Patidars, and upper castes are the bulwarks of the BJP. But the party received less support from the OBCs compared to what it got from Patidars and upper-caste voters. Among SCs, too, support for the BJP was less than the party’s overall vote share. However, this proportion was still greater than in 2017. In fact, support for the BJP increased among all the sections, except Muslims, compared to 2017,” The Hindu report quoted.
The report points out the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) entry into Gujarat’s political scene further shuffled the vote share. AAP received 12%, 15%, and 16% of the vote share from upper castes, Patidars, and Kolis respectively.
In the recently concluded assembly elections, the BJP secured a historic win by bagging 53.33 per cent vote share.
On December 10, Congress party general secretary Jairam Ramesh while speaking to reporters accused the AIMIM and AAP parties of impacting Congress’s vote share. “Gujarat election results have proved that the AAP and AIMIM have the common objective of cutting the vote share of Congress. BJP, AAP, and AIMIM had an alliance in Gujarat and it was an obstacle for us. We were fighting that,” Ramesh alleged.
