BJP wins record 67 seats in district panchayat chairman polls in UP

Lucknow:Ruling BJP and its supporting parties have made a record victory in the election of District Panchayat chairman in Uttar Pradesh by wresting 67 districts out of total 75 seats.

BJP has also broken SP's record of 63 district win, which they won in 2016.

SP have registered victories in Sant Kabir Nagar, Ballia, Azamgarh and Etah whereas in Baghpat, their partner RLD had won. SP had also won the Etawah seat unopposed.

BJP had won 21 districts unopposed while in the elections on Saturday, the party and their partners Apna Dal have won remaining 46 districts.

Independents, have won the prestigious Jaunpur and Pratapgarh districts.

BJP and its allies candidates have won elections in Muzaffarnagar, Shamli, Hapur, Bijnor, Rampur, Sambhal, Bareilly, Badaun, Aligarh, Hathras, Kasganj, Mathura, Firozabad, Mainpuri, Kanpur Nagar, Farrukhabad, Kannauj, Auraiya, Kanpur , Kanpur Dehat, Jalaun, Mahoba, Hamirpur, Fatehpur, Kaushambi, Prayagraj, Rae Bareli, Unnao, Hardoi, Lucknow, Sitapur, Lakhimpur Kheri, Amethi, Barabanki, Sultanpur, Ambedkar Nagar, Ayodhya, Basti, Siddharthnagar , Maharajganj, Kushinagar, Deoria, Ghazipur, Chandauli, Bhadohi, Mirzapur and Sonbhadra.

UP BJP president Swantra Deo Singh has congratulated the party leaders and workers for this win.

He said the popularity of chief minister Yogi Adityanath and hard work of the cadre resulted in winning 67 out of the 75 districts in the panchayat polls.

"It is just the beginning, BJP will now continue in a same way in the coming assembly polls to retain the power," Mr Singh added.

However SP spokesperson Rajendra Choudhury alleged that misuse of official machinery was the reason for ruling party's win.

Reports said, in Mainpuri, the parliamentary constituency of Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, the BJP won the election of the district panchayat president. Archana Bhadauria of BJP has become the District Panchayat chairperson.

BJP candidate Ranjana Chaudhary has won in Rae Bareli, the parliamentary constituency of Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi. Ranjana defeated Arti Singh of Congress by getting 30 votes. Congress candidate Aarti Singh got 22 votes.

SP leader Azam Khan's fort in Rampur has also been destroyed. Here Khyaliram Lodhi of BJP became the district panchayat chairman. Lodhi got 19 votes while SP candidate Nasreen Jahan got 13 votes. Leader of Opposition Ramgovind Chaudhary, accused the administration of rigging the elections, and held dharna in front of Ambedkar Park along with the SP workers.

In Lucknow, BJP's Aarti has become the District Panchayat Chairperson. Aarti Rawat defeated Vijayalakshmi of Samajwadi Party by three votes. Aarti got 14 votes and Vijay Lakshmi got 11 votes. The district panchayat had a total of 25 votes here. Samajwadi Party has alleged election malpractices in Lucknow too.

Shyam Sundar alias Sadhu Verma of BJP won the District Panchayat chairman by securing 30 votes in BSP's big stronghold Ambedkar Nagar. His rival Samajwadi Party's Ajit Yadav got 10 votes.

Ms Sapna Singh, who joined BJP on the day of nomination in Ghazipur, won the election by 27 votes. From here, Sapna Singh, who became the District Panchayat President, defeated the Kusumlata of Samajwadi Party. Kusumlata got 20 votes.

BJP's Dr. Shefali Singh won in Moradabad, the area of ??state's Panchayat Raj Minister Chaudhary Bhupendra Singh. Lalit Tanwar has already been elected unopposed from BJP in Amroha.

BJP 's Shakun Singh, has become the District Panchayat chairman from Unnao. He defeated Arun of a BJP rebel by nine votes.

In Azamgarh ,Vijay Yadav, son of former minister and MLA Durga Prasad Yadav, won by getting 79 votes out of 84. His rival Sanjay Nishad of BJP got only five votes. This is the parliamentary constituency of SP president Akhilesh Yadav.

Son of former UP minister Ambika Chaudhary, who won the election of district panchayat member with the support of BSP, won the election of district panchayat president from Ballia as Samajwadi Party candidate.

Anand Chaudhary got 33 and defeated BJP candidate Supriya Chaudhary by 9 votes.

Mamta Kishor, who returned to the National Lok Dal after going to the BJP, defeated the BJP candidate by seven votes in Baghpat. Mamta Kishor got 12 votes and BJP's Babli Devi got seven votes.

Raghuraj Pratap Singh, an independent MLA from Kunda for 25 consecutive years, showed his power in Pratapgarh. Madhuri Patel, the candidate of Jansatta Dal Loktantrik, won by getting 40 votes. SP candidate Amravati Devi got six votes and BJP candidate Kshama Singh got three votes.

In Jaunpur too, mafia don Dhananjay Sibgh's wife won the elections when Apna Dal candidate and BJP members supported her.

The magic of Union Minister Smriti Zubin Irani went on in her parliamentary constituency Amethi. Here BJP's Rajesh Agrahari alias Rajesh Masala cast 31 votes in his account in the 36-member district panchayat. Samajwadi Party's Shilam Singh had to be satisfied with only four votes.

In Shamli , BJP candidate Madhu Gurjar defeated RLD candidate Anjali by one vote.There were a total of 116 candidates in the fray for District Panchayat chairman polls in 53 districts.

In these 46 districts, there was a direct contest between as there are two candidates each. In most of these, the candidates of BJP and Samajwadi Party were face to face. There was a triangular contest on four seats, while there were three seats in which four candidates are contesting.

BJP lauds district panchayat poll result, Akhilesh alleges subversion of democracy

Even as Uttar Pradesh BJP has lauded the landslide win of the party in the district panchayat chairman polls, Samajwadi Party National President and former Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav said that the ruling party has made a mockery of free and fair District Panchayat chairman elections.

"We have never seen such a disgraceful face of power. To convert its defeat into victory, BJP used force with the help of police and administration to kidnap voters, stop them from voting and forcefully got the helpers voted in their favor. Samajwadi workers were misbehaved for opposing BJP's rigging. It seemed as if the BJP government was ready to hijack the mandate," he said.

However BJP vice president and in charge panchayat elections Vijay Bahadur Pathak has slammed the SP president for questioning the BJP government on the district panchayat chairman polls.

"When in Etawah they won unopposed and in Azamgarh, SP candidate got support of 6 BJP members and in Kanpur too 6 BJP members voted for SP , then it is not questioned by Akhikesh Yadav," Mr Pathak said.

Terming the threat given by Akhilesh Yadav to the officials , he said the State Election Commission (SEC) shoukd take action against the SP president.

Thanking the district authorities and State Election Commission(SEC) for holding free and fair polls, the BJP leader claimed that Yogi Adityanath popularity has once again being proved in the state .

Meanwhile, SP president submitting a memorandum to the State Election Commissioner on Saturday , alleged that at in almost every district authorities worked on behalf of BJP and harrassed the SP district panchayat members with denying them to vote inna democrstice way.

PM congratulates BJP on massive victory in UP district panchayat chairman polls

Prime minister Narendra Modi has congratulated Uttar Pradesh government and state BJP for landslide victory in the district panchayat chairman polls.

In a tweet on Saturday, PM said ,"BJP's spectacular victory in the UP district panchayat elections is the blessings given by Janata Janardan (people) for development, public service and rule of law."

He further said ,"The credit for this goes to the policies of Chief Minister Yogi ji and the tireless hard work of the party workers. Hearty congratulations to UP government and BJP organization for this," PM said.(UNI)