The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) stormed back to power in Uttar Pradesh, and also retained Uttarakhand, Manipur and Goa, while Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) scripted victory in Punjab.

Yogi Adityanath’s second term

Yogi Adityanath will be the first UP CM in the last 37 years to return to power after completing a full term. Congress stalwart N.D. Tiwari was the previous CM of the undivided Uttar Pradesh to secure consecutive terms in 1985. 

In the 403-member Uttar Pradesh assembly, the BJP won 255 seats, 53 more than the halfway mark of 202, while its alles Apna Dal(S) and Nirbal Indian Shoshit Hamara Aam Dal (NISHAD) party clinched 12 and 6 seats respectively.

The Samajwadi Party of Akhilesh Yadav fared way better than the 2017 Assembly polls when it had secured 47 seats. The SP won 111 constituencies and its allies Rashtriya Lok Dal of Jayant Chaudhary eight and Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party of Om Prakash Rajbhar, a former minister in the Adityanath government who joined hands with SP just ahead of the polls, grabbed six. However, Rajbhar himself lost by a staggering over 45,000 votes in Fazilnagar.

The BSP of Mayawati, a four-time chief minister, got only one seat.

The rise of AAP in Punjab

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) swept Punjab polls where it won 92 of the 117 seats, Congress 18, SAD 3, BJP 2, BSP and Independent won one seat each. In terms of vote share, the AAP won 42 per cent of the total votes cast, as against 23.7 per cent it had five years ago.

AAP chief ministerial candidate Bhagwant Mann said the oath-taking ceremony of the new Punjab cabinet will be held at Khatkarkalan in Nawanshahr district, the ancestral village of legendary freedom fighter Bhagat Singh.

The elections dealt a body blow to the Shiromani Akali Dal, which ruled the state several times, as its chief Sukhbir Singh Badal and his father Parkash Singh Badal, both former chief ministers, fell by the wayside.

CM Charanjit Singh Chann lost both seats he contested, and former CM  Amarinder Singh, who left the Congress to join hands with the BJP was also defeated.

The Congress’s vote share slumped from 38.5 per cent in 2017 to 23 per cent, with the party managing to hold on to just 18 seats as against 77 it had won five years back.

BJP returns to power in Uttarakhand

In Uttarakhand, the BJP was all set to form a second successive government, the first in the state’s 21-year history. The saffron party clinched 47 seats, 11 more than the magic figure of 36, with a vote share of 44.34 per cent. 

However, Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami lost his Khatima seat, forcing the BJP to jog its mind and find a suitable candidate for the top post.

The Congress won 19 seats, while others secured four seats.

The most notable candidates to lose in the 2022 Uttarakhand polls are Congress veteran Harish Rawat and CM Pushkar Singh Dhami, who had led their respective parties’ poll campaigns in the state and were billed to be the top contenders for the post of chief minister.

BJP retains power in Manipur

BJP won a simple majority in Manipur, where it bagged 32 seats, having won 37.83 per cent votes. Its partners in the North East Democratic Alliance (NEDA), the northeastern version of the NDA — the National People’s Party (NPP) and Naga People’s Front (NPF) — which fought separately, secured seven and five seats respectively, while Bihar ally Nitish Kumar's JD(U) won six seats.

The Congress, which gave three successive governments to the state since 2002 before the BJP engineered large-scale defections to form its government in 2017, could win just five seats with 16.83 per cent votes.

The BJP ran a coalition government with NPP and the NPF in Manipur, but it’s still unclear whether the two parties will share power in the new dispensation helmed by N. Biren Singh.

BJP set for a third term in Goa

The BJP emerged as the single largest party in Goa by winning 20 seats in the 40-member Assembly, just one shy of the halfway mark, and quickly enlisted the support of regional outfit Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party (MGP), which won two seats, and three Independent MLAs to form its government for a third consecutive term in the state. The Congress won 11 seats, down from 17 five years ago. The AAP and the MGP won two seats each, while the Revolutionary Goans Party bagged one seat.

CM Pramod Sawant won the election from his traditional Sanquelim Assembly constituency, but his two deputies Manohar Ajgaonkar and Chandrakant Kavlekar lost to Congress candidates.

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