BJP's Electoral Math: Navigating Alliance Dynamics and Split Votes in Maharashtra Ahead of 2024 Elections

The BJP-Shiv Sena had secured 50.89 percent votes in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Now the BJP is facing the challenge of reaching this figure with the help of the Shinde Sena, which has split from the Shiv Sena, and the Ajit Pawar group, which has split from the NCP. At the same time, the congress will face the challenge of crossing 50 percent with the help of the remaining Uddhav Sena and Sharad Pawar factions after the split. With the split between the two major parties, the voting criteria for the 2019 election cannot be applied to the 2024 election. Last time, Congress and NCP together got 32.05 percent votes. To get to 50 percent now, they will have to take 18 percent more votes than last time. 

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NOTA got 0.91 percent votes 
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, 4,88,766 votes were cast on NOTA. This meant that the number of people who said they did not like any candidate was 0.91% of the total votes cast.   
 
Will the Vanchit factor work?
The Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA)-AIMIM alliance had polled nearly seven percent of the votes in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, a move that fell on the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance's side. A lot will also depend on whether such a split will take place this time.

Voting in 2019

Party	Seats Contested	Seats Won	Total Votes	Share of Votes
BJP	25	23	1,49,12,139	27.84
Shiv Sena	23	18	1,25,89,064	23.5
NCP	19	04	83,87,363	15.66
Congress	25	01	87,92,237	16.41
Vanchit	47	00	37,43,560	6.92

(One seat was won by the AIMIM and one by an Independent.)

The arithmetic in the Lok Sabha had gone awry in the Assembly 

• In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance won as many as 41 seats and it was being calculated that the alliance would get more than 200 seats in the assembly elections to be held a few months later. However, something else happened in the assembly elections. 
• The BJP had won 23 seats and was leading in 122 assembly seats. However, it won 105 seats in the assembly.
• The Shiv Sena had won 18 Lok Sabha seats and was leading in 105 assembly seats, But it had to settle for only 56 seats in the Assembly. 
• The alliance had a vote share of 227 seats in the Lok Sabha, But the two together won 161 seats in the Assembly.  
• The NCP, which won four seats in the Lok Sabha elections, was leading in only 23 assembly seats; But in the assembly elections, they won 53 seats. 
• The Congress, which won one seat in the Lok Sabha elections, was leading in only 22 assembly seats; But in the assembly elections, 45 of its candidates won.