Monitoring Desk
ISLAMABAD/AHMEDABAD: Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has headed for a landslide win in his home state of Gujarat, a large boost to the Hindu nationalist political party ahead of general elections in 2024.
The BJP led in more than 80% of seats out of 182 in the early the election counting and was on its way to wresting a larger majority than in 2017 when it won 99 seats in the last state elections.
Modi is widely popular in India, partly due to economic growth and his strong base among the Hindu majority population, despite critics pointing to rising unemployment, inflation, and growing religious polarization.
Modi is eyeing a third time as prime minister in 2024 and campaigned across the state in the run-up to the Gujarat election.
The 137-year-old Congress party of India led in 26 seats, and far below the 77 seats it won in the year 2017, while the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was ahead in 9 seats, having won none the last time.
The BJP has main opposition party in Gujarat state came from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and Indian National Congress, which came out in 2012 from an anti-corruption campaign.
Modi’s hostile campaigning
In another election in the small northern state of Himachal Pradesh, the BJP hoped to ride on Modi’s negative campaigning to retain power. The congresses and the Bjb were neck and neck for seats in the 68-seat assembly.
Success in Himachal Pradesh and Gujarat will come as a welcome raise for the BJP, which lost hold of the municipal corporation in Delhi to the AAP, in the results announced.
