3 min readNew DelhiMar 23, 2026 03:22 PM IST
First published on: Mar 23, 2026 at 03:22 PM IST
Since the BJP first came to power in Assam in 2016, it has steadily tightened its grip on the state through Assembly and Lok Sabha elections, especially appearing unassailable after its dominant showing in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
After the last Assembly elections in 2021, the 2024 Lok Sabha polls are the most recent electoral test faced by parties in Assam and provide an indication of which way the political winds may blow in the 2026 Assembly polls, for which voting is scheduled on April 9.
Though the 2024 Lok Sabha polls saw the NDA win 11 seats, with the ruling BJP alone winning 9, compared to the Congress’s 3 out of the state’s total 14 seats, the Opposition party had actually managed to secure a marginally higher vote share than the BJP – 37.5% against 37.4%.
The NDA’s combined vote share of 46.3% was, however, higher than the Opposition alliance’s 39.5%. As the Congress stitches together an alliance with the CPI(M) and some smaller regional parties, this vote share divide could shrink in the forthcoming Assembly polls.
However, the BJP would derive confidence from its past successes – the NDA first ousted the Congress in 2016 by winning 86 seats in the 126-member Assembly and retained a majority in 2021 with 75 seats in a state where the majority mark is 64 seats. And since the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, the NDA has consistently won the most seats, gaining ground at the cost of a shrinking Congress.
An analysis of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls at the Assembly segment level shows that the BJP had alone led in 75 segments, clear of the majority mark in the House, while the Congress was well behind with leads in just 31 seats. Altogether, the NDA led in 95 seats.
Lok Sabha 2024 results at Assembly segment level in Assam
The vote shares at the Assembly segment level suggest that both the BJP and the Congress are largely entrenched in the segments where they were the leading party in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. While the BJP and its allies secured more than 50% of the vote share in 75 of the 95 segments where they held the lead, the Congress received more than half the votes in all but 2 of the 31 segments where it was the leading party – which suggest these parties could be difficult to displace from these segments in particular in the upcoming elections.
A comparison of the 2021 Assembly performance and the 2024 Lok Sabha polls shows that the alliances led by both the BJP and the Congress lost ground to the other’s benefit. In 2024, while the NDA lost 21 segments it had won in 2021, the Opposition similarly lost 36 segments, amounting to a net gain for the ruling alliance.
An analysis of the leading parties’ margins in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls shows that there were only a handful of Assembly segments decided by close margins. In the 17 Assembly segments where the winning party was decided by a margin under 10,000 votes, the BJP and its allies won 13 segments and the Congress 4.
As it stands, going by the results of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP seems to be in a pole position as it looks to return to power in the state for a third consecutive term.
