Fact Check: No, BJP Did Not Lose 36 Seats By Margin Of Fewer Than 2000 Votes

Every election brings with itself a wave of fake news, false claims and misleading information.

In one such case, a WhatsApp forward claiming that BJP lost a total of 8 seats by a margin of fewer than 100 votes, 19 seats by less than 1000 votes and 9 seats by less than 2000 votes, is.

Forwarding the claim, On February 12, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Satyadev Pachauri tweeted "Add this to the seats won:8 It comes to 44 seats 3% more voting could have changed the entire game."

The tweet has now been deleted.

The final tally showed that the BJP procured eight out of 70 assembly seats in the recently concluded Delhi polls and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was re-elected to form the government. The Congress drew a blank.

The viral message states that apart from the 8 seats won, the BJP lost:

1. 8 seats with a margin of fewer than 100 votes.
2. 19 seats with a margin less than 1000 votes.
3. 9 seats with a margin less than 2000 votes.

It goes on to add that they lost by a close margin and could have potentially won 44 seats (8+19+9+8=44), well past the majority mark.

Social media was abuzz with this false analysis of the election results.

Claim:

BJP lost 36 seats with a margin of fewer than 2,000 votes in Delhi

Fact Check:

The claim is false.

Official data released by Election Commission of India shows only 2 seats with such low margins of defeat for the BJP.

The message called for a dig into the Election Commission of India data.

According to the data published on their website, there are no seats below the 100 vote margin threshold, 2 seats ( Laxmi Nagar, Bijwasan ) below the 1000-vote margin threshold and just 1 seat (Adarsh Nagar) below 2000-vote margin threshold.

Ergo, it is evident that only 3 seats had a margin less than 2000.

In Bijwasan, Bhupinder Singh Joon of AAP earned 57,271 votes defeating BJP's Sat Prakash Rana who had earned 56,518 votes - by a margin of 753 votes. This is the smallest margin of this election.

In Laxmi Nagar, Abhay Verma of BJP earned 65,735 votes defeating AAP's Nitin Tyagi who had earned 64,855 votes. The vote margin was 880 votes.

Contrary to claims, only two and not 36 BJP candidates witnessed such neck-and-neck competition.

Therefore, It can be confirmed that the claim made in the viral posts is false.

If you have any news that you believe needs to be fact-checked, please email us at factcheck@thelogicalindian.com or WhatsApp at 6364000343

Also Read: Elections Over, Its Time For Aam Aadmi Party To Walk The Talk