NEW DELHI: The BJP, which suffered a shocking defeat at the hands of Nitish-Lalu-Congress alliance in the just concluded Bihar assembly elections in Bihar, is actually at the top when it comes to vote share.The party, which managed to win only 53 seats in the keenly contested elections, has got the maximum share of votes polled. At 24.4%, the BJP got a total of 92,85,574 votes in Bihar election. The total votes polled by the NDA amounted to about 1.3 crore.Compare this to the individual performance of the Mahagathbandhan partners, who together polled close to 1.59 crore or 15.9 million of the total 3.8 crore people who voted.The RJD, which emerged as the single largest party with 80 seats, got 18.4 per cent of the vote share, which translates to 69,77,094 votes.Nitish Kumar's JD(U) which won 71 seats got 16.8 per cent of the vote share, which is 63,96,164 votes. The JD(U)’s vote share in this election is misleading, since it fought 40 seats less than it did in 2010. While it had contested 141 seats in 2010, it fought 101 in these elections.The Congress, which for the first time after the 2014 Lok Sabha debacle had an election result to cheer, actually got just 6.7 per cent of the vote share or 25,39,638 votes. However, even this small percentage of votes helped the party win 27 seats in the state.No wonder, the BJP leaders have been harping on these numbers to defend their poor showing in the state.However, it is also important to take note of the fact that the BJP's increased vote share is partly because of the more number of seats it contested compared to the RJD and the JD(U). While the BJP contested on 157 seats, the RJD and the JD(U) contested on 101 seats each. The Congress had contested on just 41 seats as a part of it seat sharing deal in the mahagathbandhan.The BJP faced a similar paradox in the Delhi assembly elections earlier this year when it was decimated by Arvind Kejriwal's AAP in terms of seats despite keeping its vote share intact.However, in Bihar, the BJP's defeat got magnified by the poor showing of its alliance partners.Its two main allies, the Lok Jan Shakti Party and the Hindustani Awam Morcha (secular), could manage only meagre vote shares of 4.8 per cent and 2.2 per cent, respectively. The LJP which contested 42 seats could win only 2, while Jitan Manjhi's HAM won only one out of the 21 seats it contested.BJP's third ally the Rashtriya Lok Samta Party contested 23 seats but won only two with a 2.6 per cent vote share.The dismal show by the allies left the BJP-led NDA with a total of 34 per cent of the vote share as against the 41.9 per cent vote share of the Mahagathbandhan. And this difference of nearly 8 per cent of votes, which translated into a difference of 120 seats between the two alliances. The Grand Alliance vote share yielded them 73.2 per cent or 179 of the 243 seats.The Grand Alliance vote share performance beats the historic high of the 2010 BJP-JDU combine. Their 39.07 per cent of vote share had secured them 206 seats, which was 84.8 per cent of the 243-member assembly. It was the largest tally for any government in Bihar since 1962.(With agency inputs)