A post claimed that the BJP won 282 seats with a 31% vote share in 2014, in 2019, their vote share increased to 37%, resulting in 303 seats. Further, the post claimed that in the 2024 General Elections, BJP won 240 seats with a 39% vote share. Many such posts are being circulated on social media (here, here, and here). The post implies that an increase in vote share does not always lead to a higher number of seats. Let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Claim: BJP won 282 seats with a 31% vote share in 2014. In 2019, their vote share increased to 37%, resulting in 303 seats. In the 2024 General Elections, BJP won 240 seats with a 39% vote share.
Fact: BJP won 282 seats by securing 17,16,60,230 votes with 31.34% vote share in 2014 and won 303 seats by securing 22,90,76,879 votes with 37.7% vote share during the 2019 general elections. In the 2024 general elections, the BJP won 240 seats by securing 23,59,73,935 votes with 36.56% vote share. Hence, the claim made in the post is MISLEADING.
On performing a relevant keyword search regarding the number of seats to vote share percentage of BJP during the last three general elections, we found that BJP won 282 seats by securing 17,16,60,230 votes with 31.34% vote share in 2014 and won 303 seats by securing 22,90,76,879 votes with 37.7% vote share during 2019 general elections as per the reports of Election Commission of India.
However, according to the recent trends of the 2024 Lok Sabha General Elections, the BJP won 240 seats by securing 23,59,73,935 votes with 36.56% vote share, contrary to the claim made in the viral post.
In 2024, the BJP contested 441 seats, compared to 428 seats in 2014 and 436 seats in 2019, and secured more votes than in previous Lok Sabha elections. However, there has been a decline in both vote share and the number of seats won in the 2024 General Elections. News reports were also published examining these trends (here and here).
To sum up, the BJP’s vote share did not increase in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections compared to the 2019 General Elections.
