by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group
Voting pattern compared with 2014 LS Polls
No Modi Wave in Sight in cities
86 Urban voting pattern analyzed
Except for Mumbai, all metro witnessed low polling
Harish Gupta & Nitin Agrawal
New Delhi, May 18
The 86 Urban Lok Sabha seats which went to polls until May 12 have raised serious doubts about “Modi Undercurrent” claimed by the BJP.
Of these 86 seats, 55 were won by the BJP in 2014 where heavy polling was witnessed in all these constituencies. Barring a handful of constituencies, there was a Modi Tsunami in all these 86 seats where polling surpassed 20% in some cases.
Come 2019 and different scenario emerged. The Lokmat team compared the data of these 86 seats of three consecutive polling of 2009, 2014 and 2019 which sprang a surprises.
Instead of heavy polling in all these urban seats, 48 Lok Sabha seats witnessed very low to low polling while 38 witnessed more polling compared to 2014.
What should worry the BJP most is that 55 seats it held in 2014 out of these 86 Urban seats its vote bank slipped in as many as 28 seats. These cities included 6 out of seven seats in the Capital city of Delhi particularly the New Delhi seat where 8.26% less polling took place despite Modi and Shah addressing rallies. In Maharashtra, Pune and Nagpur, Vadodra, Ahemdabad West, Rajkot and Ahemdabad West in Modi's Gujrat, Bangalore North and Bangalore Central in Karnataka, Dhanbad in Jharkhand where Kirti Azad is contesting against a BJP stalwart, several cities of UP (Saharanpur, Barelli, Allahabad, Ghaziabad, Jhansi, Kanpur etc), all witnessed low polling.
These were the same cities which witnessed massive polling in 2014 compared to 2009. It is clear from the low polling that DeMo and poor implementation of the GST had huge negative effect in cities. While pollsters may interpret the low polling in more ways than one, but they all agree that it was not sign of any positive vote for anybody either for the candidate or for the leader.
When it came to positive voting, 27 out of these 55 seats witnessed marginal to moderate rise. Surprisingly, six Mumbai metro seats saw more polling over and above the 2014 heavy polling. This is perhaps the only metropolitan town where all three BJP seats bucked the trend from other four metro cities. The other four Mumabi metro seats held by Shiv Sena also witnessed heavy polling. It is a baffling as to why Mumbaikars differed with Delhiwalas or for that matter with Bangalorians or Chennai. The city seats in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh also bucked the trend and voter turn out was more.In Bhopal, 13% more votes were polled in 2014 over 2009. This time, polling was 8% more signalling problems for Dugvijay Singh (Congress) and victory for Sadhvi Pragya Thakur.
Ends
Total Urban Seats = 86
BJP won in 2014 = 55
Low polling in = 28
More Polling in =27
