Shiv Sena, NCP could not transfer vote to BJP in Lok Sabha polls as expected, says Maharashtra deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis

MUMBAI: The CM Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena and the NCP led by Ajit Pawar could not transfer their votes to the BJP to the extent anticipated during the Lok Sabha elections, said Dy CM Devendra Fadnavis on Monday while speaking about the Mahayuti's poor performance. He further said the BJP could not transfer as much of its votes to Ajit Pawar's party as it did to Shinde's Sena.
In an interview to an online news channel, Fadnavis said, "We had estimated that we (BJP) have a certain number of votes and along with the Shiv Sena and NCP votes, we should reach a certain number.It happened to some extent, but these two parties being new, they had limited capacity to transfer their votes to the BJP. On the other hand, the BJP transferred 90% of its votes to the two parties," he said, adding that in the assembly polls the picture would be different as people have realised the formations. He said it was difficult for the BJP to transfer its votes to NCP as they had fought against each other for years. "We had only considered a limited transfer, but even that did not happen," he said.
On the BJP's poor performance in the Lok Sabha polls in the state, winning only nine seats as against 23 in the previous elections, and its impact on seat-sharing for the assembly elections, Fadnavis said the BJP's overall vote percentage has remained unchanged.
"If you do the Lok Sabha poll analysis, we secured 43.6% of the votes, they (MVA) got 43.9%, and there are 12 seats which we lost by less than 3%. There is a typical pattern to the loss - in 5 assembly seats we are ahead and in one we fall back and lose the seat. This has happened in Dhule, Amravati, Bhiwandi, Mumbai North-East, Mumbai South-Central... This cannot be replicated in assembly elections. Our overall voting percentage has remained unchanged and so we will contest around the same number of seats as in the last elections (162)," he said.
He said seat-sharing will be based on each party's strength and limitations. "Our meetings have started and our direction has also been decided. There will be hard negotiations on certain seats, but this time it will be less because we have realised that in the LS polls, the hard bargaining on certain seats had its repercussions on those seats and (with) late declaration (of candidates) we could see we were losing the seat," he said.
He brushed aside the revival of the Congress in Vidarbha and Marathwada, calling it a "swelling."