Number Theory: Decoding BJP’s political fortunes in Uttar Pradesh in 5 charts

BJP is the only political party in Uttar Pradesh to have crossed the 30% vote share threshold since the 1990s.

How many seats will the Bharatiya Janata Party win in the state of Uttar Pradesh? The answer to this question will pretty much decide the outcome of the ongoing Lok Sabha elections. While one must wait for the results, here are five charts which underline just what Uttar Pradesh means to the BJP’s political fortunes.

A child holds a placard depicting PM Modi and the BJP election symbol during a public meeting in Uttar Pradesh. (PTI Photo)

Decoding BJP’s political fortunes in Uttar Pradesh in 5 charts

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  The BJP’s 2019 vote share is the third highest ever in the state since 1962

  Uttar Pradesh was perhaps the toughest state for the BJP in the 2019 elections. It faced a united opposition comprising of two regional heavyweights, Samajwadi Party (SP) and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP). While the BJP did suffer a fall in its Uttar Pradesh tally between 2014 and 2019, it still managed a big victory, winning 62 out of the 80 parliamentary constituencies (PCs) in the state. What made this possible was a vote share of 49.6% . How big was the BJP’s victory in terms of popular support in Uttar Pradesh? It is the third largest since 1962, the earliest period for which this data is available in the Trivedi Center for Political Data (TCPD) database. The record for largest and second largest vote share in Uttar Pradesh is held by the Bhartiya Lok Dal (later rechristened the Janata Party) in the 1977 elections and the Congress in the 1984 elections. 1977 and 1984 were not normal elections as they were held in the aftermath of the Emergency and Indira Gandhi’s assassination. BJP is the only political party in Uttar Pradesh to have crossed the 30% vote share threshold since the 1990s. Our analysis has excluded all parliamentary constituencies which were part of the Uttarakhand in the united Uttar Pradesh.
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  BJP’s seat share to vote share ratio in Uttar Pradesh was only the fifth largest in 2019

  In a first-past-the-post system, the seat-to-vote share ratio is a good metric to measure a party’s ability to convert popular support into seats. On this count, the BJP did rather badly in 2019 . It had a seat share to vote share ratio of 1.56 in 2019 which is only the fifth largest for the BJP in the state. This number was the highest for the BJP in 2014 when it won 88.8% of the PCs with a vote share of 42.3%. To be sure, the fall in BJP’s seat share to vote share ratio in 2019 is a result of a bigger index of unity within the opposition. With the BSP and the SP not fighting together anymore, it will be interesting to see what is number is in 2024.
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  Forty BJP MPs had a vote share of at least 50% in 2019

  40 of the total 62 BJP MPs in 2019 won with a vote share of at least 50% . It was the highest ever so far for the party in Uttar Pradesh. In 2014, only 17 out of 71 BJP MPs polled at least 50% of the vote. While the BJP finished as the single largest party in Uttar Pradesh in three more elections apart from 2014 and 2019, the share of BJP candidates who crossed the 50% vote share threshold was much lower than in 2019.
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  Uttar Pradesh’s relative importance in BJP’s overall Lok Sabha tally has decreased

  With 80 PCs, Uttar Pradesh is the largest state in terms of number of representatives in the Lok Sabha. Without 71 and 62 PCs from the state in 2014 and 2019, the BJP would not have crossed the halfway mark of 272 in the elections. However, the relative importance of Uttar Pradesh in BJP’s overall tally, has actually gone down in 2014 and 2019 compared to the 1990s when the BJP finished as the single largest party in the state in every national election except 1999. More than anything else, this is a reflection of the BJP’s growing national footprint in the last decade.
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  Regional dynamics of the BJP performance in Uttar Pradesh

  Trivedi Centre for Political Data (TCPD) at Ashoka University classifies Uttar Pradesh into seven broad regions -- Avadh, Bundelkhand, Doab, East, North-East, Ruhelkhand and West regions. East UP has the highest number of 16 PCs. Avadh and Doab have 14 PCs each. North-East and Ruhelkahnd have 12 PCs each while West UP and Bundelkahnad have 8 and 4 PCs respectively. In both 2014 and 2019, BJP had the highest vote share in the western parts of the state -- 51% in 2014 and 53% in 2019. In 2019, the BJP vote share was at least 50% in all the regions except eastern parts of the state and Ruhelkhand. It is the eastern part of the state which will vote in the last phase of the elections on Saturday.