BJP retains all five seats in Ghaziabad, Sunil Sharma wins by record victory margin

According to the Election Commission of India figures, the highest victory margin in all five states--UP, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur--where votes were counted on Thursday was secured by BJP’s Sunil Sharma, sitting MLA from Sahibabad, who defeated Samajwadi Party’s (SP) Amarpal Sharma by 214,835 votes

All incumbent MLAs from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Ghaziabad district’s five constituencies--Ghaziabad, Sahibabad, Loni, Muradnagar and Modinagar--secured their second consecutive win in the Uttar Pradesh assembly election.

This is Sunil Sharma’s second consecutive highest victory margin in Uttar Pradesh, a feat he first achieved in 2017 by besting Amarpal Sharma, then Congress candidate, by 150,685 votes. (Sakib Ali/HT Photo)

According to the Election Commission of India figures, the highest victory margin in all five states--UP, Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur--where votes were counted on Thursday was secured by BJP’s Sunil Sharma, sitting MLA from Sahibabad, who defeated Samajwadi Party’s (SP) Amarpal Sharma by 214,835 votes. This is also his second consecutive highest victory margin in Uttar Pradesh, a feat he first achieved in 2017 by besting Amarpal Sharma, then Congress candidate, by 150,685 votes.

.As per official figures, Sharma secured 322,882 out of the 481,616 votes polled in Sahibabad assembly constituency, which also happens to be the biggest assembly constituency in UP comprising 1,020,386 voters.

“I give the entire credit of my victory to the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and chief minister Yogi Adityanath, as well as our party workers... Now, we will complete pending works on priority. UP has voted for development and nationalism, and not for appeasement and caste-based politics,” Sunil Sharma said.

The BJP this time had reposed faith in all its sitting MLAs for the five seats of Loni, Muradnagar, Sahibabad, Ghaziabad and Modinagar. Nandkishor Gurjar won the Loni seat by a margin of 8,676 votes defeating Madan Bhaiya of the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD). The Muradnagar seat was won by Ajitpal Tyagi who trounced RLD’s Surendra Kumar Munni by 97,095 votes. Atul Garg, UP’s minister for health, won the Ghaziabad seat by a margin of 105,537 votes, defeating Vishal Verma of the SP. In Modinagar, Dr Manju Shiwach routed Sudesh Sharma of the RLD by a margin of 34,619 votes.

“We attribute our party’s victory to chief minister Yogi Adityanath’s efforts and the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The results indicate that people voted for a better governance model,” said Chandra Mohan, spokesperson and secretary of the BJP state unit.

According to experts, the Samajwadi Party did not adequately counter the BJP’s poll planks of crime and riots during the previous regimes.

“The BJP successfully raised the issues of crime and riots during their campaigns. The SP could not successfully tackle them. The poor and the marginalised also voted for the BJP in large numbers as they received much-needed help in the form of ration during the pandemic. The Centre also withdrew the three contentious farm laws just in time, which helped the BJP minimise their negative impact in western UP,” said KK Sharma, associate professor (history), MM College, Modinagar.

“People majorly voted for the BJP based on PM Modi and CM Adityanath’s appeal, rather than the candidates’. CM Adityanath has emerged as a prominent face with zero tolerance against crime and corruption. The BJP was also able to secure its core vote bank by peddling the agendas of Hindutva and construction of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya,” said Sanjay Mishra, associate professor (political science), MMH College, Ghaziabad.

The SP, meanwhile, continued its poor show in Ghaziabad.The last time an SP candidate won in the district was in 1996 when Rajpal Tyagi defeated BJP candidate Vivek Tyagi by a margin of 3,321 votes in Muradnagar.

In 2017 too, all the five seats in the district were secured by the BJP, while in 2012, four seats went to the Bahujan Samaj Party and one went to the RLD. In 2007, there were three seats in Ghaziabad, each one bagged by the BJP, BSP and an independent candidate.

The SP contested the 2022 assembly election in alliance with the RLD in western UP. The RLD won one seat in 2017, and bagged eight seats in the state on Thursday.

The spokespersons and leaders of the SP and Congress could not be reached for comments despite repeated attempts.

“The mandate has been given by people and we will now remain as opposition. However, RLD’s vote share and seats have increased this time,” said Trilok Tyagi, national general secretary of RLD.