...
...
Next Story

18 out of 19 MLAs who won on the Congress ticket in Assam are Muslims

Of the 20 Muslim candidates fielded by Congress, 18 emerged victorious. In contrast, only one of the 79 non-Muslim candidates fielded by the party won.

Updated on: May 5, 2026, 12:42:26 IST
Advertisement

In the recently concluded Assembly elections across multiple states, the Indian National Congress (INC) and its allies have recorded notable results among Muslim candidates, even as the party’s overall performance remains mixed.

In Assam, the Congress won 19 seats, of which 18 were secured by Muslim candidates. (PTI File)
In Assam, the Congress won 19 seats, of which 18 were secured by Muslim candidates. (PTI File)

In Assam, the Congress won 19 seats, of which 18 were secured by Muslim candidates. Of the 20 Muslim candidates fielded by the party, 18 emerged victorious, indicating a high conversion rate. In contrast, only one of the 79 non-Muslim candidates fielded by the party managed to win.

Congress ally Raijor Dal won two seats. One of its winning candidates is Muslim, while the other, Akhil Gogoi, has faced investigation by the National Investigation Agency in the past over alleged Maoist links.

In Kerala, 35 Muslim MLAs have been elected in the 140-member Assembly. Of these, 30 belong to the Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF). Within this bloc, eight Congress MLAs are Muslim, while all 22 MLAs from the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), a key UDF ally, are from the community.

Meanwhile, in Tamil Nadu, Congress nominated two Muslim candidates, one of whom won.

Across Assam and Kerala, Muslim candidates fielded by Congress and its allies have recorded a winning strike rate exceeding 80%, reflecting strong electoral consolidation in specific constituencies.

However, political analysts caution against broad generalisations. They note that candidate selection in Indian elections is often shaped by constituency demographics, local alliances, and voting patterns, rather than any single factor determining electoral success.

 
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Shishir Gupta

Shishir Gupta is Executive Editor at Hindustan Times and one of India's top journalists covering national security, strategic affairs, foreign policy and geopolitics. Over the past three decades, he has extensively reported on India's military, diplomatic and security landscape, covering every major conflict and national security challenge, from the 1999 Kargil War and the 2020 East Ladakh standoff to Operation Sindoor in 2025. He has also covered major terror attacks, including the IC-814 hijacking, the 26/11 Mumbai attacks and the 2025 Pahalgam terror strike, along with numerous Pakistan-backed terrorist incidents in the Kashmir Valley and across India. He has reported on national and state elections for more than three decades. A recognised authority on strategic affairs, Gupta has covered India's nuclear programme since the Pokhran-II (Shakti series) tests in May 1998 and has written extensively on global nuclear issues, Indian diplomacy and the country's expanding global outreach. He has also reported widely on international conflicts and terrorism, with a special focus on the Indian subcontinent. Gupta has interviewed Prime Minister Narendra Modi more than four times, including Modi's first interview with the print media after becoming Prime Minister in May 2014. His other interviews include three with the Dalai Lama, as well as conversations with Benjamin Netanyahu, Amit Shah, Yogi Adityanath, S. Jaishankar, Nirmala Sitharaman and Piyush Goyal. He is the author of Indian Mujahideen: The Enemy Within (Hachette, 2011) and Himalayan Face-off: Chinese Assertion and Indian Riposte (Hachette, 2014). He was awarded the Chevening-Wolfson Joint Scholarship at Wolfson College, University of Cambridge, UK, in 1998 and participated in the International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) of the US State Department in 2006. He received the Ben Gurion Prize from Israel in 2011 and the K. Subrahmanyam Prize for Strategic Studies in 2015 from the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (MP-IDSA). Since 2024, he has hosted Point Blank, Hindustan Times' weekly YouTube show on global geopolitics.

Get the latest India News, breaking headlines and real-time updates from across the country. Stay informed about politics, government policies, crime, weather and major national developments.
Get the latest India News, breaking headlines and real-time updates from across the country. Stay informed about politics, government policies, crime, weather and major national developments.
SHARE THIS ARTICLE ON
Hindustantimes wants to start sending you push notifications. Click allow to subscribe