Bharatiya Janata Party setback in Maharashtra may have kept the bigwigs like Prime Minister Narendra Modi and political maverick Amit Shah out of the limelight but they sure have reasons to break a sweat. With the latest loss at the state-level political game, the BJP has been reduced to mere 40 per cent of the national landscape as compared to a whopping 71 per cent it commanded over in 2017.

The BJP has been riding a roller coaster of political triumphs and defeats for the past five years. From holding power in only seven state assemblies in 2014 to a staggering 21 by 2018, the BJP swept the nation with the Modi wave.

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As the wave, named after PM Modi and credited to BJP's Chanakya Amit Shah, went across the nation, it took India's map on a colourful journey. In 2014, the saffron on India's map looked like patchwork on a fabric of predominately blues and greys with a splash of saffron. But by mid-2018, saffron dominated India's map with hints of blues and greys.

In 2014, BJP ruled over Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Goa and Arunachal Pradesh - directly or with alliance partners. By September 2018, the only states BJP did not rule were Tamil Nadu (AIADMK), Kerala (LDF), Karnataka (Congress), Mizoram (Congress), Punjab (Congress), Odisha (BJD), West Bengal (Trinamool Congress) and Telangana (TRS).

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The graph was slow and steady, from seven in 2014 to 13 in 2015, 15 in 2016, 19 in 2017 and then 21 in 2018. But the buck stopped there.

Even though BJP continued to score victories and topple governments in the most unexpected corners of the country, such as Mizoram, it started loosing in its bastions like Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh. Alliance partner TDP broke off, taking Andhra out of BJP-led NDA's hands. Jammu and Kashmir was lost to President's Rule by December last.

The BJP's luck did not shine in its favour in 2019 as well. Even as the Modi government has made a historic comeback in the Lok Sabha elections, the state-level politics continue to test the BJP.

While the BJP's BS Yediyurappa managed a coup in Karnataka and formed the government after a dramatic political turmoil, a similar situation seems to have trumped the BJP in Maharashtra.

Home to the saffron ideologue RSS's home, Maharashtra has slipped through the BJP's fingers after they lost a game of chess with Shiv Sena as well as NCP.

After Devendra Fadnavis's resignation on Tuesday (November 26), the BJP has been reduced to 17 states. The number may not seem very disheartening but geographically, the BJP has lost big states while winning smaller ones.

The region ruled by the BJP, with or without allies, has fallen from 71 per cent in 2017 to 40 per cent by Tuesday.