Demolishing Congress' Bastion Chhindwara, BJP Clean Sweeps Madhya Pradesh

Bhopal: Creating history in Madhya Pradesh, the BJP on Tuesday scored a sweeping win in the state by clinching all 29 Lok Sabha seats, including Congress bastion Chhindwara, with Union ministers Jyotiraditya Scindia, Faggan Singh Kulaste, and Virendra Kumar emerging victorious. In the recent seven-phase long elections, the polls delivered a mandate unexpected by many with the BJP winning 240 seats, while Congress, being limited to double-digit secured just 99 seats

For the first time in 40 years, with 29 seats in its favour, the BJP became the first political party to have achieved such a feat. In 1984, Congress had won all 40 Lok Sabha seats.

This year, the BJP managed to breach the Congress' long-hold Chhindwara, which it failed to capture in the 2019 elections when it had won 28 seats in the state. The saffron party once emerged victorious in Chhindwara in 1952.

However, this year, the victory margin of the BJP ranged between 1 lakh to 5 lakh votes in 26 constituencies, while in Bhind, Gwalior, and Morena constituencies the margin stood under 1 lakh.

The most spectacular wins in MP were achieved from Indore, where BJP's Shankar Lalwani, potentially recorded the highest-ever margin of 11,75,092 votes, followed by Vidisha from where former CM and BJP stalwart Shivraj Singh Chouhan won by a staggering margin of 8.21 lakh votes.

Moreover, other consistencies in which the BJP secured a margin of over 5 lakh votes are Khajuraho (5.41 lakh), Guna (5.40 lakh), Bhopal (5.01 lakh) and Mandsaur (5 lakh).

Additionally, other prominent BJP candidates who merged victorious include Union ministers Jyotiraditya Scindia, Faggan Singh Kulaste, and Virendra Kumar from Guna, Mandla and Tikamgarh constituencies, respectively.

Scindia won the Guna Lok Sabha seat with a margin of 5.40 lakh votes, defeating Congress's Yadvendra Rao Deshraj Singh by polling 9.23 votes. Meanwhile, Union minister Kulaste defeated Congress's Omkar Singh Markam by a margin of 1.03 Lakh votes from the Mandla (ST) seat. Saffron party leader Kulaste polled 7.51 lakh votes, while Markam bagged 6.47 lakh votes.

(Inputs from PTI)