2024-06-05 06:45:02
File picture of Samajwadi Party President Akhilesh Yadav in Lucknow
| Photo Credit: PTI
The Samajwadi Party and Congress of the INDIA bloc are leading in 34 and 7 Lok Sabha seats in Uttar Pradesh, the Election Commission’s data for polls to the 80 parliamentary constituencies showed. The BJP-led NDA leads in 35 seats.
Also read: Follow live updates of 2024 election results in Uttar Pradesh
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was leading in 35 seats and its allies Rashtriya Lok Dal and Apna Dal in one seat each. Chandrashekhar of Azad Samaj Party (Kanshiram) was leading by 1,09,799 votes over BJP’s Om Kumar.
Among the prominent leaders who have taken comfortable leads over their rivals is Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Varanasi, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh in Lucknow, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav and his wife Dimple Yadav in Kannauj and Mainpuri, Congress candidates Rahul Gandhi and Kishori Lal Sharma in Rae Bareli and Amethi.
SP’s blow to BJP
From winning five seats in the last election in partnership with the BSP, Akhilesh Yadav’s party in UP has dealt a bodyblow to the BJP, which had in 2019 won 62 seats on its own.
Mr. Yadav led the opposition’s campaign from the front in the key political state, pairing well with Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress and Arvind Kejriwal’s outfit.
Also read: For constituency-wise real-time updates, visit our Election Results page
This was the first general election after the death of SP patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, and Akhilesh did not disappoint, to the extent, it now leads on more seats than won in the 2004 election.
The turnaround for the opposition came even as Mr. Yadav, along with Rahul Gandhi, was disparaged as “Do ladko ki jodi” often by Mr. Modi.
In the fray from Kannauj Lok Sabha seat, Mr. Yadav took it upon him to drum up support for his wife Dimple Yadav, and three cousins, who all are in the fray.
Earlier in the campaign, Mr. Yadav forced the BJP to recalibrate its narrative, somewhat even sending it on a backfoot, when he retorted to the ruling party’s jibe of nepotism, saying those with no family had no right to call out others.
The rebuttal sent entire BJP brass, as well as grassroots workers, to append “Modi ka Parivaar” in their social media bios.
The SP had given 18 seats to Congress, one to TMC, and had fielded its own candidates in the rest of the total 80 constituencies.
