BJP leads in Gujarat, confident of retaining power

Gandhinagar, Dec 18 

Gujarat's ruling BJP on Monday said it was confident of retaining power in the state as vote count showed its candidates were racing ahead in 82 of the 182 Assembly seats.

Candidates of the Congress, which had pledged to end the Bharatiya Janata Party's rule of Gujarat since 1995, were ahead in 52 constituencies, counting trends indicated less than an hour after the vote count began at 8 a.m.

"We are going to form a government in Gujarat. People have voted for us on development issues," BJP leader Shahnawaz Hussain told the media.

It was the first Assembly election in Gujarat since Narendra Modi became the Prime Minister in 2014. Modi had led the BJP to victory in the election in 2012.