Will Gujarat trend of Congress gains in general elections snap?

Gujarat, which votes today, is generally regarded as a cake-walk for the BJP. It has been winning the state assembly elections since 1995 - five times in a row. It has won a majority of the 26 Lok Sabha seats in the state since 1989. But in the past decade, a distinct voting pattern has emerged in Gujarat - many more people vote for the BJP in the state assembly elections than in the Lok Sabha elections. Its principal rival in the state, Congress, appears to gain in the national race.

Whether this time round this dualism will continue or not is the million dollar question. The one factor which may upturn this trend is that Modi is being projected as the Prime Minister by BJP and this could motivate Gujarati voters to vote for BJP. But, as data from past elections shows, more than half of Gujarati voters have been voting against Modi since his rise to chief ministership.

The BJP won 14 seats in the 2004 general elections conceding 12 to the Congress. In 2009, it won 15 while the Congress won 11. The last time BJP won decisively in a general election was in 1999, grabbing 20 seats.

Since the 2002 assembly elections, which saw Narendra Modi sweep to power, Gujarati voters have been determinedly swinging between the BJP and the Congress. In the last two general elections (2004 and 2009) the statewide difference between the BJP and the Congress was just 5.3 to 5.5 lakh votes. In percentage share terms this works out to just 3 to 3.5% of the total votes polled.

When it comes to the state elections, voters turn decisively in favour of the BJP with average statewide difference in the votes polled by the two parties reaching about 22 lakh in 2002 and increasing to nearly 25 lakh in 2012. In percentage share terms, the margin of difference between the two parties was about 11% in 2002 and 2007 but dipped to about 8% in 2012.

The sharp narrowing of the percentage margin in 2012 could be because of an unexpected factor coming into play: voter turnout. Usually, voter turnout in Gujarat has been low in general elections. It was about 45% in 2004 and 48% in 2009. But in assembly elections it has always been higher - around 60% in 2002 and 2007, but shooting up to 72% in 2012.

So, in 2012, a high voter turnout appeared to have benefitted the Congress more reducing its percentage margin of difference from the BJP. In state assembly elections, the BJP has been getting about 49% votes compared to about 38 to 40% votes garnered by the Congress. In Lok Sabha elections, the BJP gets about 47% while the Congress gets about 43% votes.