The second chart shows the vote shares of the two main INDIA bloc partners, the JMM and the Congress, in Jharkhand since 2009. Together, the two have managed to win about 33 percent of the vote share. The 2024 election looks like an outlier with the duo winning a combined vote share of more than 38 percent.
Compared to the 37 percent won by the BJP-AJSU, the JMM-led alliance did have an edge in this assembly election. But that edge becomes a decisive and unassailable lead when you add up the vote shares of the smaller INDIA bloc partners in Jharkhand.
More worrying for the BJP, it will find it very difficult to bridge the gap in the future.
The other alliance partners of the JMM are the RJD, the CPI (ML) and the other communist parties, and it is they who are building a wall for the BJP that …