A tied election
What happened
This was a hung house — a result where no single party wins enough seats to govern alone.
The Indian National Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party tied at 31 seats, short of the 35-seat mark.
It edged ahead only on vote share — the slice of all ballots cast that went to one party or candidate — 43.5% to 39.0%.
What changed
The party that had dominated the previous election saw its seat tally fall sharply.
Its own seat count fell from 52 to 31.
34 of the state's 68 constituencies changed hands from the previous election.
19 of those flipped straight from the INC to the BJP.
Notable numbers
A few numbers from that election stand out.
Kutlehar, Himachal Pradesh saw an extraordinarily close finish, decided by a margin — how far ahead the winner finished, in votes, over whoever came second — of just 3 votes.
At the other extreme, Rohru, Himachal Pradesh was the most one-sided contest, with the winner ahead by 62.9% of the vote.
Turnout — the share of registered voters who actually cast a ballot — was lowest in Simla, Himachal Pradesh, at just 42.7%.
Kulu, Himachal Pradesh had the largest electorate of any seat that year, with 79,908 registered voters.
The backdrop
A new party had just broken away from one of the two main ones, ahead of this election.