A BJP MLA, who was seen doing sit-ups and giving a massage to a voter during the Uttar Pradesh Assembly poll campaigns, has retained his seat, official results showed. Bhupesh Chaubey from Robertsganj constituency in Sonbhadra district secured 84,496 (or 40.29 per cent) of the total votes counted, defeating his nearest rival, Avinash Kushwaha of the Samajwadi Party (SP) by over 5,600 votes, according to the Election Commission website.
Kushwaha got 78,875 (or 37.61 per cent) of the total 2.09 lakh votes that were counted on the seat, according to the Election Commission. A total of 10 candidates were in the fray for the Assembly poll from Robertsganj, including Chaubey, who had won the constituency election in 2017 to become a first-time MLA.
The 47-year-old BJP MLA had hogged the limelight during poll campaigns after he was seen doing sit-ups holding his ears from the stage of an election rally, in a bid to seek forgiveness of the voters of his constituency. A few days later, while on a door-to-door campaign, he was seen giving a massage to an elderly voter, who was apparently having a pain in his legs and lower back. Chaubey had met him and applied ointment on his body.
While videos of both the events went viral on television and social media, he also became the butt of a joke with even SP chief Akhilesh Yadav taking a dig at the BJP in his rallies over Chaubey’s acts. The BJP has retained power in Uttar Pradesh winning a majority of the 403 seats and is set to form the government with Yogi Adityanath at the helm of affairs once again.
Extra Vigilant SP Candidate Loses Polls
A Samajwadi Party candidate, who went extra-vigilant ahead of counting of votes and kept an eye on the local election office through binoculars, has lost the Uttar Pradesh assembly poll, official results showed. Yogesh Verma of the SP contested from Hastinapur constituency in western UP’s Meerut district where he lost to BJP’s Dinesh Khatik, the sitting MLA, by a margin of 7,312 votes, the Election Commission (EC) website showed.
Verma got 1 lakh (43.55 per cent) of the total votes counted while Khatik polled in 1.07 lakh (46.72 per cent) votes, the EC data showed. In the wake of the exit polls and amid allegations of EVM mishandling at some places in Uttar Pradesh on March 9, Verma was seen moving in an open gypsy and using binoculars to keep an eye on the strong-rooms from a distance.
While no EVM mishandling was reported from Hastinapur during or ahead of vote counting, Verma got into news as videos of his extra-vigilant act surfaced on news and social media. Another popular contestant from Hastinapur seat was Congress’ Archana Gautam, a model-actor turned politician, who appeared nowhere in the electoral battle on the seat.
Archana got 1,519 (0.66 per cent) of the votes while BSP’s Sanjeev Kumar raked in 14,240 votes, the third highest among the total eight candidates in the seat. The BJP has retained power in Uttar Pradesh after the 2022 assembly polls, winning a majority of the 403 seats in the state and is set to continue with its Yogi Adityanath-led government once again.
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