How Tripura has voted in last 4 elections?

The BJP did an unthinkable in 2018 polls by securing 43.59 per cent vote share.

New Delhi, Feb 14: With just two days to go for Tripura polls, Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday claimed that the BJP will cross the majority mark in the state election before 12 pm.

From zero, the BJP became a hero in 2018 by ousting the Left Front government which ruled Tripura for 35 years from 1978. Like last election, the saffron party is having an alliance with Indigenous People's Front of Tripura (IPFT). Can the BJP manage to emerge victorious again? Well, the answer will be known on March 2 on the day results will be announced, but let us take a look at how Tripura has voted in the last four elections.

In 2013 polls, the BJP was not taken seriously by any party. The CPM had emerged victorious by secured 48.11 per cent and won 49 seats in 60-member assembly. Despite getting 36.53 per cent vote share, Congress secured 10 seats. With zero seats, the BJP gained 1.54 seats. In 2014 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP got 5.7 per cent vote share and both Lok Sabha seats were bagged by the CPI.

Five years later, the BJP did unthinkable as it ended the Left Front government's 25 year rule. It won 36 seats and its ally IPFT bagged 8 seats while CPI was reduced to 16 seats.

In 2018, the BJP's vote share rose to 43.59 per cent and IPFT secured 7.38 per cent. Interestingly, CPM's vote share stood at 42.22 per cent. A close to six per cent vote share drop brought down its seats from 48 in 2013 to 16 in 2018. Congress got a deathly blow as it got just 1.79 per cent votes.

A year later in 2019, BJP won two Lok Sabha seats with a 49.03 per cent votes while CPI's vote share dropped to 17.31 per cent votes. The BJP had gone solo and that cost 17 per cent of its vote share in the Tribal seats.

Tribal votes (11.66 lakh voters) play a key factor in Tripura as they form one-third of the total population of close to 30 lakh electorates, as per 2011 census.

With the entry of Pradyot Bikram Manikya Deb Barma's Tipra Motha Party (TMP) into the poll fray, this assembly is predicted to become a triangular contest.

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