One party finally wins outright
What happened
One party won outright control of the Goa assembly this time, without needing help from anyone else.
The Bharatiya Janata Party took 21 of the 40 seats.
That was exactly enough for a majority, with none to spare.
The Indian National Congress followed at a distance with 9.
What changed
This was the first election held on Goa's redrawn constituency boundaries.
The lines had just gone through delimitation — the official redrawing of constituency boundaries, which happens every so often as India's population shifts.
The party that won went from 14 seats to 21.
Notable numbers
A few numbers from that election stand out.
Turnout — the share of registered voters who actually cast a ballot — reached about 82.7%, the highest Goa had recorded to that point.
The tightest finish: Sanguem, Goa was decided by just 483 votes — the narrowest margin, how far ahead the winner finished, in votes, over whoever came second, anywhere in the state that year.
At the other extreme, Mapusa, Goa was won by a margin of 50.3% of the vote — the widest margin of the year, measured as a share of the vote rather than in votes.
Canacona, Goa was the state's largest constituency by registered voters, with 31,822 names on the rolls.
The backdrop
Goa had been a full state for some years by this point, electing its assembly under the same seat structure it still uses today.
On 30 May 1987, the Goa, Daman and Diu Reorganisation Act, 1987 split the union territory of Goa, Daman and Diu: Goa became India's 25th state with its own Legislative Assembly, while Daman and Diu remained a separate union territory. The next general election, in 1989, was Goa's first as a full state.