India, Jan. 21 -- The hard-fought civic elections, a historic win for the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance in Mumbai, turned out to be a far closer contest than they appeared to be. Beyond the slim nine-seat gap between the ruling parties and the combined opposition, the vote share tells a more nuanced story.

The vote share - the percentage of votes polled by a party - reveals a party's true standing with voters, and the percentage for both the BJP and Shiv Sena has declined, compared to the last election in Mumbai, the 2024 assembly polls.

A comparison shows that while the BJP's vote share has declined perceptibly from assembly polls to civic elections (29.34% vs 28.03%), the Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena has suffered a significant dent (18.36% vs...