Lok Sabha elections: Nitin Gadkari leading by 95,427 votes over Congress rival

Nagpur election result: Elections to the 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra were held in 5 phases from April 19 to May 20.

Nagpur election result: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Nitin Gadkari is leading from the Nagpur Lok Sabha seat.

Nagpur election result: BJP leader Nitin Gadkari.(HT photo)

Data from the Election Commission show that at 3.30pm, Gadkari was ahead of his nearest rival, Vikas Thakre of the Congress, by 95,427 votes. Follow full coverage of the Lok Sabha elections.

Elections to the 48 Lok Sabha seats in Maharashtra were held in five phases from April 19 to May 20. Voting in Nagpur was held in the first phase on April 19.

This is the third time Gadkari is contesting the Lok Sabha elections from Nagpur. The former BJP president first contested the election from Nagpur in 2014 and then againin 2019.

In 2014, Gadkari had defeated veteran Congress leader Vilas Muttemwar, while in the 2019 polls, he defeated Congress candidate Nana Patole, who is now the grand old party's Maharashtra unit chief. While Gadkari had polled 6,60,221 votes, Patole got 4,44,212.

During the election campaign, Gadkari released his own "manifesto", promising to create one lakh jobs in the next five years if re-elected and put the urban constituency in Maharashtra among the top five cities in terms of development and cleanliness.

Gadkari's 'Vachannama' or election manifesto, underlined his vision for Nagpur for the next five years.

Gadkari emphasised that in his third term he would work towards making Nagpur 'sundar and swachh' (beautiful and clean) and putting it among top five cities in the country in terms of development, sanitation and hygiene.

The former BJP president also promised that with the help of state and central governments, he would help give ownership rights to residents of unauthorised slums on regularisation and help them in the construction of new houses. The Union minister had said that he had already started the work in one of the slum areas in the city and given ownership rights of 500 to 600 houses.

Maharashtra has 48 Lok Sabha seats, the second-largest after Uttar Pradesh. In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP won 23 out of 25 seats it contested in alliance with the undivided Shiv Sena.