The ruling BJP wrested Rampur assembly seat from the Samajwadi Party, but the principal Opposition party was able to retain the prestigious Mainpuri Lok Sabha seat in bypolls. The result for the by-polls was announced on Thursday. However, the BJP suffered a setback as it lost its Khatauli seat to the RLD.
In Mainpuri by-poll, SP candidate Dimple Yadav, wife of party president Akhilesh Yadav, defeated BJP’s Raghuraj Shakya by a record margin of 288461 votes. She received 64 per cent votes, while her opponent got 34.18 per cent votes.
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Earlier, Dimple was an MP from Kannauj, but had lost to the BJP in 2019. In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, former defence minister and former UP chief minister Mulayam Singh Yadav had won Mainpuri seat by around 94,000 votes by getting 53.75 per cent of votes.
In Rampur, SP candidate Asim Raza lost to the BJP’s Akash Saxena by 34,136 votes. The BJP polled 62 per cent of votes the SP candidate got just 36 per cent of votes. The Rampur by-poll was held after the disqualification of SP leader Mohammad Azam Khan who had won the seat for a record seven times.
RLD candidate Madan Bhaiya, an alliance partner of the SP, won Khatauli assembly seat by 22,143 votes against the BJP candidate Rajkumari Saini. The RLD candidate got 54 per cent of votes and the BJP nominee received 41.72 per cent of votes.
The by-poll in Khatauli was necessitated after sitting BJP member Vikram Saini was disqualified for his conviction in a criminal case and his wife Rajkumari was the BJP candidate. Vikram had won the seat in 2017 and 2022 on the BJP ticket. RLD’s strength in UP assembly has gone up to nine.
