Four months after losing its majority in parliament for the first time in a decade, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) secured a record third term in the northern state of Haryana and scored its best ever performance in Indian-administered Kashmir, marking a dramatic turnaround.
In Haryana, the Congress lost the election despite exit polls predicting it would win comfortably amid anger against the state’s BJP government among sections of people, including farmers and champion wrestlers. The BJP won 48 seats in the latest state elections, an increase from the 40 seats it secured in 2019, while the Congress secured 36, up from 31. The majority mark is 46 in the 90-member assembly.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has expressed gratitude to the people of Haryana for bringing back the BJP with its biggest mandate ever. “They (Congress) provoked the youth against the army. Their anti-India politics won’t work. Every family in Haryana voted with patriotic fervour. Some groups are trying to weaken the institutions in India and are conspiring against the country with foreign agents. Deshbhakt Haryana ensured such plots are not successful,” said PM Modi.
Among major losers are Haryana assembly speaker and BJP’s Gian Chand Gupta, Haryana Lokhit Party Gopal Kanda and BJP leader O P Dhankar.
From Julana seat, Congress’s Vinesh Phogat registered a victory defeating her nearest BJP rival Yogesh Kumar by a margin of 6,015 votes.
Congress said that the election results in Haryana are unexpected and shocking and the Congress cannot accept them.
“As you can imagine, this allows bad-faith actors to spin narratives that undermine the process. You can see examples of it already playing out on social media. Our fear is also that such narratives can then be used by these mala fide actors to influence processes where counting is still underway i.e. in most of the counting centres,” senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh wrote.
BJP secured 10 out of 11 seats in the Jammu division in Jammu and Kashmir assembly elections. This was the first time that the union territory voted in an assembly poll since 2014 and also the first after the abrogation of Article 370. A total of 1,031 candidates were in the fray in Jammu & Kashmir.
With 49 seats, the the NC-led alliance crossed the majority mark in the 90-seat Assembly. Even as the number of seats won dipped for one ally – Congress – from 12 in 2024 to six in 2024, it rose for the other ally. The NC won 42 seats, a significant increase from 15 in 2014.
The National Conference and the Congress are set to form the Jammu and Kashmir government after securing a majority on Tuesday. The BJP garnered 29 seats while the Mehbooba Mufti-led PDP secured three. NC chief Farooq Abdullah said his son and senior party leader Omar Abdullah would be the next Chief Minister.
BJP’s Haryana Hat-Trick With Biggest Ever Win; National Conference and Congress to form government in Jammu and Kashmir
