Lucknow, Oct 28 The BJP won six of the 11 Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council seats while the Samajwadi Party secured three, with the polls seen as symbolically crucial ahead of the 2027 Assembly elections, officials said on Wednesday.
Besides the three seats, the Samajwadi Party (SP) also celebrated victory in the Lucknow graduates’ constituency, although an official announcement was awaited.
The SP candidate was also leading by 9,491 votes in the graduates’ constituency in Varanasi at the end of the fifth round of counting around 11.30 pm, according to poll officials.
The six seats that the BJP won include the Agra graduates’ constituency, the Bareilly-Moradabad teachers’ constituency, the Lucknow teachers’ constituency, Meerut’s teachers’ and graduates’ constituencies, and the Gorakhpur-Faizabad teachers’ seat, where Independent candidate Rajiv Yadav has alleged voter manipulation.
The SP won the Allahabad-Jhansi graduates’ constituency, and the teachers’ constituencies in Varanasi and Agra-Aligarh.
In the Agra graduates’ seat, the BJP’s Manvendra Pratap Singh (Guruji) was declared winner.
The BJP retained the Bareilly-Moradabad teachers’ seat, where its candidate Hari Singh Dhillon defeated SP nominee Danish Akhtar by 17,676 votes.
Returning officer and Bareilly Division Commissioner Shambhu Kumar said Dhillon received 21,672 votes against Akhtar’s 3,996 after all five rounds of counting were concluded.
The BJP also won the Lucknow teachers’ constituency, where Umesh Dwivedi defeated SP’s Sushil Kumar by 6,992 votes. Dwivedi secured 13,179 votes against Kumar’s 8,371, according to the results.
In Meerut, the BJP won both the teachers’ and graduates’ seats.
According to an official, BJP candidates Dinesh Kumar Goyal (graduates’) and Shri Chand Sharma (teachers’) were declared winners in Meerut.
The BJP also retained the Gorakhpur-Faizabad teachers’ constituency, with its candidate Dhruv Tripathi defeating Independent nominee Rajiv Yadav by a narrow margin of 307 votes.
Tripathi secured 14,887 votes against Yadav’s 14,580 in the closely fought contest.
However, Yadav alleged that the election had been manipulated to ensure his defeat, claiming that around 1,000 votes had been stolen.
Yadav said he would approach both the Election Commission and the court to challenge the results. He also demanded a forensic examination of the 1,612 votes counted in the fourth round, alleging irregularities in the counting process.
During the counting, disputes arose over the margin of votes and the procedures followed. The candidates raised objections after 52 additional votes were found in a ballot box at a booth in Mau than what was recorded in the official data.
Additional commissioner of Ayodhya, Ajay Saini, was removed following a complaint lodged by a candidate.
However, the administration maintained that the counting process followed the rules.
In the Allahabad-Jhansi graduates’ seat, SP candidate Mansingh Yadav was declared elected, while Lal Bihari Yadav from the party emerged the winner in the Varanasi teachers’ constituency.
Samajwadi MP from Chandauli, Virendra Singh, questioned the district administration over an alleged delay of around six hours in announcing the results.
In the Agra-Aligarh teachers’ constituency, SP’s Akash Agrawal defeated BJP’s Hari Kishore Tiwari.
Earlier, SP president Akhilesh Yadav shared a video on X in which Agrawal was seen in a torn kurta, with his supporters alleging that he was assaulted.
“Let the BJP explain how the treatment meted out by its people to SP MLC candidate Akash Agrawal, who is winning from Agra, can be justified,” Akhilesh Yadav said.
The former chief minister also urged the Election Commission, the Supreme Court and the President of India to take cognisance of the matter immediately.
The society is deeply outraged by such “inhumane treatment” and “violence” against Agrawal, he said on X.
“Even the Agrawal community has now realised that the BJP is no one’s ally,” the SP chief claimed.
Voting was held on Friday for 11 Member of Legislative Council (MLC) seats in Uttar Pradesh, comprising five graduates and six teachers’ constituencies.
The MLC polls are being seen as a prestige battle between the BJP and the SP ahead of next year’s Uttar Pradesh elections.
Before the polls, the BJP held six of the 11 seats – Agra, Meerut-Saharanpur and Lucknow graduates’ seats and the teachers’ constituencies in Bareilly-Moradabad, Lucknow and Meerut-Saharanpur.
The SP held three – the Varanasi and Allahabad-Jhansi graduates’ seats and the Varanasi teachers’ constituency.
The remaining two seats – Agra and Gorakhpur-Faizabad teachers’ constituencies – were held by Independents.
(PTI News)
