Gandhinagar: On a day when ‘Tsunami’ of Modi’s popularity has swept the country giving single handed majority to BJP again, the ruling party has also repeated the feat of winning all the 26 Loksabha seats in Gujarat, the home state of PM Narendra Modi, during counting of votes today.

BJP has won 15 of the seats with a margin of more than 3 lakh votes of which 3 were won by that of over five lakh votes and one by more than 6 lakh. Party candidate on Navsari seat, C R Patil has emerged victorious with the highest margin of more than 6.77 lakh. Amit Shah won on Gandhinagar seat with a margin of over 5.55 lakh votes leaving behind the last time margin achieved by then party candidate L K Advani (4.83 lakh).

Darshanaben Jardosh has won with a margin of over 5.47 lakh votes on Surat seat While Ranjanben Bhatt has also won with over 5.36 lakh votes in Vadodara.

Among other seats with won by more than 3 lakh margin are Rajkot, Ahmedabad-East, Ahmedabad-West, Panchmahal, Kheda, Chhota Udepur, Banaskantha, Bharuch, Valsad, Kutch and Bhavnagar.

BJP has also won the four assembly seats of Manavadar, Dhrangadhra, Jamnagar-Rural and Unjha where by-polls were held. With this the tally of the ruling party in the 182 member state assembly has reached to 104.
On all the LS and assembly seats BJP defeated Congress candidates as nearest rival.

Fate of a total of 371 LS candidates were to be decided in Gujarat, a known bastion of BJP where the ruling party had won all 26 seats in the last general election in 2014.

The polling percentage this time was record all time high 64.11. It was 64.7% in 2014

The fight ws expected to be tough on some of the erstwhile traditional Congress seats in the state including Banskantha, Anand, Patan, Surendranagar, Bardoli, Chhota Udepur, Junagadh and Amreli but it turned out to be a cake-walk of sorts for BJP in the end.

Among the four former ministers contesting the polls are Bharatsinh Solanki (Congress, Anand seat), Tushar Chaudhari (Congress, Bardoli-ST), Mansukh Vasava (BJP, Bharuch) and Mohan Kundariya (BJP, Rajkot). While Sokanki and Chaudhari lost Vasava and Kundariya won. Water Resources minister of Gujarat Parbat Patel, the BJP candidate in Banaskantha seat also won easily. Union Minister Jaswantsinh Bhabhor also won on Dahod seat.
Congress had fielded 8 of its MLAs including Leader of Opposition Paresh Dhanani (Amreli) in the fray, all of whom lost.

Polling on all the 26 Loksabha seats of Gujarat and 4 assembly segments by-poll was held simultaneously in the third phase of the seven phased LS polls on April 23 due to resignation of as many Congress MLAs .

Chief Electoral Officer S Murali Krishna said there were a total 371 candidates for LS polls in Gujarat and for assembly by-polls a total 45 candidates had remained in the final fray, Krishna said.
Among LS seats maximum 31 candidate were on Surendranagar seat while minimum 6 were on Panchmahal seat. For assembly by polls necessitated due to resignation of 4 Congress MLAs, Manavadar seat had minimum 8 candidates and maximum 15 on Jamnagar-rural seat. On the remaining two seats of Dhranadhra and Unjha and equal number of 11 candidates were contesting.

Among the 8 congress MLAs contesting the election, Amreli MLA Dhanani was contesting on Amreli Lok Sabha seat, Kaprada MLA Jitu Chaudhary on Valsad, Una MLA Punjabhai Vansh on Junagadh, Dhoraji MLA Lalit Vasoya on Porbandar, Tankara MLA Lalit Kagathara on Rajkot, Modasa MLA Rajendrasinh Thakor on Sabarkantha and 79-year old Limbi MLA Somabhai Gandabhai Patel on Surendranagar seat. Congress MLA from Gandhinagar North seat C J Chavda had been made party candidate against BJP president Amit Shah on Gandhingar seat.
BJP had given tickets to six women candidates Shardaben Patel (Mahesana), Sitting MP Poonam Madam (Jamnagar), Sitting MP Bhartiben Shiyal (Bhavnagar), Sitting MP Ranjanben Bhatt (Vadodara), Gitaben Rahtwa (Chhota Udepur) and Sitting MP Darshana Jardosh (Surat), all of whom won while sole Congress woman candidate Geetaben Patel on Ahmedabad-East seat lost by a margin of more than 3 lakh votes.

So far as Muslim candidates were concerned Congress had fielded just one Sher Khan Pathan from Bharuch seat while BJP had given ticket to none.

The 26 LS constituencies and winners in Gujarat are – Kutch (SC) – Vinod Chavda, Banaskantha- Parbat Patel, Gandhinagar- Amit Shah,, Patan- Bharatsinh Dabhi, Mahesana – Shardaben Patel, Sabarkantha- Dipsinh Rathod, Ahmedabad-East – Hansmukh Patel, Ahmedabad-West (SC)- Kirit Solanki , Rajkot- Mohan Kundariya, Porbandar- Ramesh Dadhuk, Jamnagar- Poonam Madam,,Junagadh- Rajesh Chudasama, Amreli- Naran Kachhadiya, Bhavnagar- Bhartiben Shiyal,Anand- Mitesh Patel alias Bakabhai, Kheda -, Devusinh Chauhan, Dahod (ST) – Jasawantsinh Bhabhor, Vadodara- Ranjanaben Bhatt, Chhota Udepur(ST)- Gita Rathwa, Bharuch-Masukh Vasava, Bardoli(ST)- Prabhu Vasava, Surat- Darshana Jardosh, Navasari- C R Patil, Valsad(ST)- K C Patel.

DeshGujarat