Setback for Hooda on home turf as BJP’s Valmiki wins Rohtak mayoral election

Ram Avtar Valmiki, who defeated Suraj Mal Kiloi by 45,198 votes, said triple engine government of the BJP will expedite developmental works in Rohtak.

In a major setback for the opposition Congress, BJP candidate Ram Avtar Valmiki was on Wednesday declared winner of the Rohtak mayoral election. Valmiki defeated Suraj Mal Kiloi of the Congress by 45,198 votes.

BJP’s Ram Avtar Valmiki celebrating his victory over Suraj Mal Kiloi of the Congress in the Rohtak mayoral election on Wednesday. (Manoj Dhaka/HT)

Valmiki polled 1,02,269 votes, while Suraj Mal got 57,071 votes in the high-stakes election.

The Rohtak mayoral election results are a major setback to former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda as the Congress candidate lost the battle despite the party winning all four assembly seats in the assembly polls in October last year.

Interacting with the media, Valmiki, who lost three consecutive assembly elections in 2009, 2014 and 2019 from Kalanaur (SC) seat in Rohtak, said he owes his victory to residents of Rohtak and party workers, who believed in the BJP’s ideology of carrying out development work.

“The triple engine government of the BJP will expedite development works in Rohtak. We will fulfil all our poll promises,” he said.

Former Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar’s ex-media adviser Rajiv Jain defeated Congress’s Kamal Diwan by 34,766 votes for the Sonepat mayor bypoll. The bypoll was necessitated after sitting mayor Nikhil Madan of the Congress switched sides to the BJP. He contested the assembly polls on the BJP ticket from Sonepat and won.

Rajiv Jain was miffed after the party denied the assembly ticket to his wife and former minister Kavita Jain from Sonepat last year. This time, the party nominated him as its mayoral candidate and he emerged victorious.