Are BJP, allies facing ‘vote jihad’ in Maharashtra? The data does not agree

However, polling information paints a antithetic picture. According to the data, compared to the 2019 Assembly polls, the BJP and its allies person seen their ballot shares turn during the Lok Sabha elections successful much than fractional the 38 Assembly segments wherever Muslims comprise a important chunk of the electorate.

Of Maharashtra’s 288 Assembly seats, Muslims represent astatine slightest 20% of the colonisation successful these 38 constituencies, including 9 wherever they marque up much than 40% of the population. At the authorities level, Maharashtra’s 1.3 crore Muslims relationship for 11.56% of the full 11.24 crore population, arsenic per the 2011 Census.

Of these 38 seats, the BJP and the Congress won 11 each successful the 2019 authorities polls, with the undivided Shiv Sena adjacent down astatine 9 seats, followed by the undivided Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) astatine three, and the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the AIMIM astatine 2 each.

But contempt the important Muslim colonisation successful these seats, lone 8 of the full 10 Muslim MLAs successful the existent Assembly were elected from these constituencies. Among the 10 constituencies with the highest Muslim populations, the BJP, the Congress, the Shiv Sena, and the SP each secured 2 seats, portion the AIMIM and the NCP won 1 each successful 2019

After the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) won 30 of the state’s 48 parliamentary seats successful the Lok Sabha elections this year, BJP leaders claimed that the enactment bore the brunt of Muslim consolidation, referring to it arsenic “vote jihad”.

However, the information reveals that the ballot shares of the BJP and its allies accrued successful 20 of the 38 Assembly segments successful the Lok Sabha elections. In Raver, which the Congress won successful the 2019 Assembly polls, the BJP recorded its highest summation successful ballot stock astatine 20.13 percent points. The lone constituencies wherever the Mahayuti parties’ ballot shares declined by much than 10 percent points were Mankhurd, Bhiwandi West, Byculla, Aurangabad Central, Akot, Parbhani, and Beed.

Historically, the BJP, but for the 2014 Assembly elections erstwhile it contested each seats successful Maharashtra, has paid small attraction to the 38 Muslim-dominated constituencies. In 2019, it contested lone 18 of these seats, leaving the remainder to its allies, including the undivided Shiv Sena.