DEHRADUN: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) secured a conclusive victory in all five Lok Sabha constituencies of Uttarakhand for the third consecutive time. The party's candidates won with substantial margins exceeding 1.5 lakh votes in each seat. In the Nainital-Udham Singh Nagar constituency, sitting MP Ajay Bhatt received 7.7 lakh votes, defeating Congress candidate Prakash Joshi by a staggering 3.3 lakh votes.
This margin surpassed Bhatt's previous victory over Congress leader Harish Rawat in the 2019 elections.
Former Uttarakhand Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat, contesting his maiden Lok Sabha election, comfortably won the Haridwar constituency. He secured 6.5 lakh votes, defeating Virender Rawat, son of former CM Harish Rawat, by a margin of 1.6 lakh votes.
Here is the full list of winning candidatesIn the Tehri constituency, Mala Rajya Laxmi Shah of the BJP, a member of the erstwhile royal family of Tehri Garhwal, achieved her fourth consecutive victory. Shah garnered a winning margin of 2.7 lakh votes against Congress candidate Jot Singh Gunsola.
The Congress party faced another disappointing result in Uttarakhand, failing to secure any Lok Sabha seats. However, independent candidate Boby Panwar surprised observers with an impressive performance, garnering over 1.5 lakh votes.
Despite the BJP's hat-trick of victories in Uttarakhand, the party experienced a slight decline in its vote share compared to the 2019 elections. The BJP's vote share decreased to around 56.8%, a drop of more than 4% from the 61% it secured in 2019. Nonetheless, the party's performance still surpassed its 2014 results, where it obtained 55.3% of the vote share.
On the other hand, the Congress party witnessed a marginal increase in its vote share, rising to 32.8% from 31.4% in the previous Lok Sabha elections. However, this improvement did not translate into any seat victories for the party.
Across all five constituencies, BJP candidates saw a reduction in their victory margins compared to the 2019 polls. In the Pauri Lok Sabha seat, BJP's national chief spokesperson Anil Baluni defeated Congress's Ganesh Godiyal by approximately 1.5 lakh votes, a significant decrease from the over 3 lakh winning margin in the 2019 elections.
Political analyst SMA Kazmi attributed the BJP's slightly reduced victory margins to local anti-incumbency sentiments. However, he emphasized that the party's overall success in retaining all five seats in Uttarakhand for the third consecutive time demonstrates its strong presence and support base in the state. Kazmi noted that the BJP's performance in Uttarakhand surpassed its results in other states such as Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, and Rajasthan.