The victory comes at a time when the BJP is aiming to win all 80 Lok Sabha seats in the state in 2019.
New Delhi: The BJP’s victory march in Uttar Pradesh, which started with the landslide win in the assembly election in March, has continued with its stellar performance in the civic polls, results of which were declared Friday.
While the BJP won 14 of the total 16 mayor posts, the BSP bagged two. In 2012, the BJP had won 10 of 14 mayor posts.
The BJP treated this election as a referendum on the Yogi Adityanath government’s performance. “The people of UP have continued to show faith in our development work and this victory has given us additional responsibility to deliver on the promises we have made,” Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath told a press conference.
This was an election where Adityanath campaigned extensively, addressing 40 rallies in 14 days covering the entire state, a first by a chief minister in the state.
The victory comes at a time when the BJP is targeting to win all 80 Lok Sabha seats in the state in the 2019 election.
Two new municipal corporations — Ayodhya and Mathura — were created this time and the BJP won both.
In addition, the BJP also dominated the nagar palika (municipal council) elections — the party won or was leading in 100 of 198 seats as of 4 pm Friday.
While Mayawati’s BSP has shown signs of revival by leading in or winning 42 municipal council seats, the Samajwadi Party couldn’t open its account in the corporation elections and could win only 22 seats in the nagar palika polls.
The BJP has a strong support base in urban areas and the results indicate the party is consolidating its position in small towns and villages as well.
There were also concerns that traders would be unhappy with the party due to the roll out of GST. But the BJP gave eight tickets to the trader community and all of them won.
The performance of the BSP is the surprise of this election. The party was contesting the civic polls for the first time and managed to win two mayor seats — in Aligarh and Meerut — and came second in eight others, mostly in western UP.
In 2014, it had failed to win a single Lok Sabha seat and bagged only 17 assembly seats in this year’s elections.
The Samajwadi Party has lost big time with its support bases such as Etawah, Mainpuri, Firozabad, Kanpur and Kannauj slipping away.
In Mainpuri, a number of independent candidates supported by Shivpal Singh Yadav, the marginalised uncle of party chief Akhilesh Yadav, managed to win the elections.
“We still hope that the final results will change a bit since counting is still on. But yes, it is a mandate given by people and we will analyse the reasons for our defeat,” said Sunila Yadav Sajan, SP spokesperson.
I don’t understand how these mass murderer of infants in Gorakh pur, Agra and Saifai are winning where thousands of infants died due to their mismanagement and levied blame on doctor’s and suppliers of oxygen who supplied oxygen even without payment of money for few months. I feel pity on the people of up, God gives strength to people of up.