Gujarat polls: Gandhinagar set to remain Modidham

This time, the Congress party in Gujarat in an apparent change of strategy, focussed on developmental issues rather than taking directly on Chief Minister Narendra Modi in the recently concluded Assembly polls.

The Congress party was happy that the Keshubhai Patel-led Gujarat Parivartan Party (GPP) was locking horns with Modi at a personal level. However, this piggybacking may not yield the desired result for Congress, as per a post-poll survey conducted by CSDS for IBN7 and The Week.

With a massive 68 percent and 70 percent voting in the two phases respectively, talks are also ripe if Modi will retain his turf in a whirlwind manner as he did in 2007 capturing 117 seats in the 182-seat Assembly.

The exit poll predicts that BJP will get 53-63 seats out of the 87 seats that went for polls in the first phase on 13 December. The Congress is set to get between 19-27 seats while others will get 3-9 seats.

According to the survey, the BJP got 45 percent of the votes in the first phase, Congress received 33 percent, GPP 12 percent and the Others bagged 10 percent.

The counting of votes is on 20 December.