The just concluded Gujarat assembly elections have brought different lessons for various sections of people and organisations.
The strongest message the Gujarat electorate have sent out is that the state would remain bipolar for ages to come, their choice being limited to the two major parties-the ruling BJP and the opposition Congress.
This message is evident from the poll results as no new entrant in the poll fray has been entertained by Gujarat’s 4.32 crore voters.
Not only that the new entrants could not win any seat in the 182-member assembly, all their candidates have lost their security deposits too.
The Shiv Sena, one-time ally of the BJP, had contested this election independently by fielding 42 candidates. But all of them have lost their security deposits. As many as 31 of the 42 Shiv Sena nominees got less than 1,000 votes, many of them even below the None Of The Above (NOTA) votes in the constituency.
Similarly, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) fielded 29 nominees but all of them forfeited their deposits .
The vote share of AAP and Shiv Sena put together was less than the total NOTA votes (1.8 per cent) against the BJP’s 49 per cent and 41 per cent of the Congress.