Sharad Pawar’s worst election performance: NDA dominates Maharashtra vote count

Mumbai: Early trends in the Maharashtra Assembly election count paint a grim picture for Sharad Pawar’s party and his alliance partners in Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA). This appears to be Sharad Pawar’s worst electoral performance in his long career. The NDA, or Mahayuti alliance, is surging ahead, holding a commanding lead over the MVA Opposition bloc, significantly outpacing predictions of close contest.

Four hours into the vote count, NDA candidates held a lead on over 220 seats, far exceeding the majority mark of 145. Conversely, the MVA, comprised of the Congress, Shiv Sena (Uddhav Thackeray faction), and Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), struggles to gain traction, currently trailing with approximately 55 seats.

The disparity in performance is stark. Early trends reveal striking differences in win rates. BJP boasts an impressive 84 per cent success rate (122/145), Shiv Sena (Eknath Shinde faction) is at 71 per cent (58/81), and Ajit Pawar’s faction of the NCP is at 62 per cent (37/59).

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In contrast, the MVA factions show significant struggles. Congress’s win rate hovers around 19.2 per cent (20/102), Shiv Sena (Uddhav Thackeray faction) at 20.6 per cent (18/92), and the NCP (Sharad Pawar faction) showing an abysmal 11.6 per cent (10/86).

Despite Sharad Pawar’s attempts to bolster confidence, an online meeting with his candidates on Friday where he expressed optimism about the MVA forming the government in Maharashtra, the early returns paint a bleak picture for his party’s performance. His call for candidates to remain at counting centers and travel directly to Mumbai with victory certificates seems increasingly irrelevant as the NDA marches towards an assured victory.

For the first time ever, an alliance in Maharashtra has crossed the 200-seat mark, according to data from the Election Commission of India. The results reveal a historic milestone, with the BJP alone securing more seats than the entire MVA combined, further cementing its position as the most trusted party in the state.

This victory marks the biggest triumph for a pre-poll coalition in Maharashtra since 1972, and the Mahayuti alliance is on track to surpass a 50 per cent vote share, based on current Election Commission trends.

The last time any alliance garnered over 50 per cent of the vote share was in 1972, when Congress claimed 56 per cent in the wake of the 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War. Since then, no coalition has reached the 50 per cent threshold—until Mahayuti’s groundbreaking performance in the 2024 elections. Notably, this achievement surpasses the vote share of the BJP-SHS alliance in 2014, which was propelled by a 15-year anti-incumbency sentiment against the Congress government.