While reserved Scheduled Tribe (ST) constituencies of Dahod and Chhota Udaipur recorded the highest share of NOTA votes at 3.12 per cent and 2.34 per cent, respectively, BJP-dominated seats of Gandhinagar and Navsari – won by a margin of over seven lakh each by outgoing Union minister Amit Shah and Gujarat BJP chief CR Paatil, respectively – also saw a surge in NOTA votes.

Across India, Indore in Madhya Pradesh saw NOTA votes bagging the second spot with 2.18 lakh votes. While BJP’s Shankar Lalwani won by a margin of over 11.75 lakh votes, 13 other candidates contested from the seat. However, none were from the Congress, as the party’s candidate withdrew from the race to join the BJP. The Congress had then gone on to urge voters to vote for NOTA in the polls.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls in Gujarat, NOTA votes cast in constituencies like Bharuch, Sabarkantha, Jamnagar, Porbandar and Surendranagar had ranked fifth, sixth and seventh among all votes polled.

This time, NOTA votes were widely the third choice in all constituencies except Jamnagar, where 11,082 NOTA votes were cast, ranking fourth. The constituency saw 14 candidates contesting this time against the 28 in 2019.

The ST reserved seat of Dahod, won by BJP’s Jaswantsinh Bhabhor for the first time, saw the highest NOTA votes polled among all constituencies. Nearly 35,000 voted in favor of NOTA, comprising 3.12 percent of the total vote share. This is a marginal increase in favor of NOTA in the seat compared to 2019 when around 32,000 NOTA votes were polled, comprising 3 per cent of the seat’s vote share. The increase comes despite nine more candidates contesting from Dahod compared to the seven in 2019.

After Dahod, ST reserved seats Chhota Udepur and Bardoli polled 29,655 and 25,542 NOTA votes, respectively, making it to the list of top three constituencies that recorded maximum NOTA votes this year.

Apart from the tribal reserved seats, Bharuch also came as a surprise. With only around 6,000 voters opting for NOTA in 2019, nearly 17,000 more people voted for NOTA this year, taking the total NOTA voters in the constituency to over 23,000. The BJP’s tribal leader, Mansukh Vasava, was elected from the seat for the seventh time. Opposing him was AAP MLA Chaitar Vasava and 11 others.

Sabarkantha, too, saw NOTA exercised by around 15,000 more electors this time – a jump from 6,103 in 2019 to 21,000 this year. BJP’s Shobhanaben Baraiya won the seat, which had seen the least NOTA votes polled in 2019.

Some other seats where NOTA voters saw a significant jump included Navsari and Gandhinagar, as well as Banaskantha, won by Congress’ Geniben Thakor, giving the party its first Lok Sabha seat from the state in 10 years.

Gandhinagar seat saw its NOTA voters’ tally increase by over 7,700 votes — from 14,214 in 2019 to around 22,000 in 2024. In Navsari, NOTA voters increased by over 11,000, from around 9,000 in 2019 to 20,462 this year. Notably, while 25 candidates contested from Navsari in 2019, the number of contestants reduced to 14 this year.

In Banaskantha, NOTA voters increased by around 9,400 — from 12,728 votes polled in 2019 to 22,167 this time. Thakor won the seat by the lowest margin of 30,406 recorded across Gujarat.

Interestingly, the Ahmedabad East seat, which with 18 candidates saw the maximum number of contestants across the 25 seats, saw the least number of NOTA votes polled at 10,503.

Not only that the number of NOTA votes have increased – from around 4 lakh in 2019 to 4,60,341 in 2024 – the NOTA vote share too increased by 0.18 percentage points, from 1.38 per cent in 2019 to 1.56 per cent in 2024.

Albeit, a key difference in the two elections is also the fact that while 371 candidates contested in 2019, the number reduced to 265 in 2024, with one of the 26 Lok Sabha seats, Surat, not even going for a contest after it was won. uncontested by the BJP.

Additional Chief Electoral Officer Kuldeep Arya said that while NOTA forms a minuscule part of the total votes polled, “it is the law to provide voters with this option and thus, it continues as an option”.

Asked if the EC sees its efforts to push more voters to the voting booth go to waste with an increase in the NOTA vote share, Arya said: “Our job is to take the voter to the booth. As part of making them aware of their rights, we also inform them that they can either vote for a candidate or exercise the option of NOTA. Once they reach the booth, it is up to them how they want to exercise their franchise.”