Leading over his nearest rival and Congress candidate Avtar Singh Bhadana by a record margin of over six lakh votes till late on Thursday evening, the BJP’s sitting MP and Faridabad candidate Krishan Pal Gurjar said it was not a “Modi wave” but a tsunami that had swept away the Opposition.
Heading towards a bigger victory compared to the 2014 elections when he defeated Mr. Bhadana by a margin of 4,66,873 votes, Mr. Gurjar said he credited PM Narendra Modi, party president Amit Shah and the electorate for his unprecedented victory, besides CM Manohar Lal Khattar.
Though the final figures were awaited, Mr. Gurjar was set to win hands down having polled more than nine lakh of the around 12 lakh total votes cast.
Mr. Bhadana, who had quit the BJP to join the Congress just before the election, got only 2,74,983 votes — which is around 20.72% of the total votes cast.
Mr. Bhadana had quit the Congress after the loss in the previous LS election to first join the INLD and then successfully contest the Meerpur seat in Uttar Pradesh on a BJP ticket in 2017.
Besides a “Modi wave”, Mr. Bhadana could have also been hit by infighting within the party. The Congress had first announced Tigaon MLA Lalit Nagar as its candidate, but later changed its mind to field Mr. Bhadana leading to bad blood between the two. Mr. Nagar and other Congress MLAs in the district are considered close to former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda, who is not on good terms with Mr. Bhadana.
Bahujan Samaj Party’s Mandhir Mann was the distant third with just 84,006 votes — around 6.53 % of the total votes cast.
AAP Haryana chief Naveen Jaihind, a joint candidate of AAP and Jannayak Janta Party, managed to bag only 10,982 votes, which is less than 1% of the total votes polled. AAP national convener and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and JJP leader Dushyant Chautala had also took out a roadshow in his support, but it seemed to have no impact on the electorate.
Accepting people’s mandate, Mr. Jaihind, in a tweet, sought to know whether the people voted for “kaam [work]” or “kaand [scandal]”, referring to the violence during the BJP rule in Haryana.
The final figures were awaited at the time of going to the press.
