Modi wave resurfaces: Exit polls indicate big victory for BJP in Maharashtra and Haryana,Haryana Maharashtra Assembly election updates, Haryana Maharashtra Exit Poll 2014

Modi wave resurfaces: Exit polls indicate big victory for BJP in Maharashtra and Haryana 
NEW DELHI: The Narendra Modi-Amit Shah gamble of going solo in Maharashtra and Haryana seems to have paid off if exit polls are any indication. Every single poll showed BJP emerging on top with one poll even predicting the party will score a simple majority on its own in these two states.

BJP's seat tally in Maharashtra, according to various polls, varied from just over 100 to 150-plus, the latter a clear majority mark in a 288-member assembly. In 90-seat Haryana, exit polls gave BJP between 37 and 50-plus seats; the latter a majority mark.

Interestingly, BJP's stellar performance in Maharashtra, according to exit polls, comes from winning around 27% vote share. A five-cornered contest, a consolidated vote for Modi, and fragmentation of votes between Congress, NCP and the two Senas would seem to explain BJP's big seat gains with less than 30% vote share.

Maharashtra, therefore, in some ways mirrors the general election results in May, where BJP won 282 seats in the 545member Lok Sabha with just over 30% of the national vote. The Modi-Shah strat egy of aggressive pitch for votes in the name of Modi and tight orga nisational approach would seem to have paid off again, assuming exit polls have got the picture right.

The polls also predicted Congress performing poorly in both states, and indicated that dynasty big guns such as Thackerays and Pawars in Maharashtra and Lals in Haryana could be rendered irrelevant for now. For Prime Minister Modi, a victory in the polls would be a personal credit since the party had gone to the people without projecting any local leader as chief minister and had sought votes in his name. For BJP president Shah, who took the audacious call to sever ties with 25-year-old ally Shiv Sena in Maharashtra and HJC in Haryana just days before the polls, a stellar performance would be a fitting reply to the critics who had railed him for the bad performance of the party in assembly bypolls in Uttar Pradesh last month.

Good results in the two states will increase BJP's Rajya Sabha tally, giving it more legislative elbow room in Parliament. If actual results mirror exit polls', Modi-Shah's grand plan of making BJP the main party in every major state will gain a huge fillip. The relevance of NDA may come under question in case of major solo wins in the next round of assembly elections.

The BJP-Sena split had made the Maharashtra election campaign particularly vicious with the Sena repeatedly playing the Marathi vs Gujarati card alluding to the ethnicity of Modi and Shah. But they had chosen not to reply to Sena barbs, a decision that would now make the victory sweeter. Modi addressed nothing less than 27 rallies in Maharashtra and 11 in Haryana that seems to have made up for the party's reluctance to put up one single face as the CM candidate. Shah was able to run a tight war room and ensured none of the other big leaders — Devendra Fadnavis, Vinod Tawde or Pankaja Munde — stepped out of the line claiming the potential chief ministership for themselves.

About 62.5% of Maharashtra's 8.35 crore voters cast ballots in a bitterly fought election as per figures available. Prominent among those whose electoral fate will be decided when counting takes place on Sunday include former chief minister Prithviraj Chavan, his deputy and senior NCP leader Ajit Pawar, state BJP president Fadnavis, leader of Opposition in the legislative assembly Eknath Khadse, his counterpart in legislative council Vinod Tawde (both BJP), Shiv Sena leader in the outgoing assembly Subhash Desai and his MNS counterpart Bala Nandgaonkar.

src:economicstimes

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