Of the 40 assembly seats in Goa, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has won 20 and the Congress-Goa Forward Party (GFP) alliance, 12. This is a reversal of the results of the 2017 polls in the state, when the BJP and the Congress won 13 and 17 seats, respectively, when both outfits had contested independently.
No single pre-poll alliance or party crossed the halfway mark. In fact, the BJP needs the support of either independent winners or the lone MLA of the Revolutionary Goans Party (RGP), registered as a political party only this year by a former AAP worker from the state on the plank of protecting the rights of people of Goan origin.
This scenario is not very different from the 2017 election, and shows that regional concerns continue to play an important role in the coastal state. If seats lost to spoilers are any indication, their importance only increased this time.
In the 2017 election, the BJP lost the highest number of seats (7) to spoilers, three of them coming from independents. In 2022, the BJP lost eight seats to spoilers. Three of these seats were spoiled by the RGP. A party is said to have spoiled a seat for a party finishing second if it finished third and had more vote share than the victory margin for the seat.
The Congress, which lost only two seats to spoilers in 2017, has lost six seats to spoilers in 2022. RGP was responsible for two of these losses and an independent candidate for one. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Trinamool Congress have spoiled two and one seats, respectively, for the Congress.
{{/usCountry}}The Congress, which lost only two seats to spoilers in 2017, has lost six seats to spoilers in 2022. RGP was responsible for two of these losses and an independent candidate for one. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Trinamool Congress have spoiled two and one seats, respectively, for the Congress.
{{/usCountry}}Chart 1: Seats lost to spoilers in 2017 and 2019
The continued importance of regional parties in the state can also be gauged from their performance within the alliances led by the Congress and Trinamool Congress. The GFP performed just as well or badly as the Congress on the three seats it was given to contest in the alliance. The Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP) has performed far better in the 13 seats it was given to contest than the TMC has in the 26 seats it contested.
Chart 2: Strike rate (%)