Actor and Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Kangana Ranaut on Tuesday won from Himachal Pradesh’s Mandi constituency with a margin of 74,755 votes.
Ranaut secured 5.37 lakh of the total votes while Congress leader and Himachal Pradesh minister Vikramaditya Singh won 4.62 lakh votes. This was Ranaut’s first time contesting a Lok Sabha election.
Singh conceded defeat on Tuesday afternoon, reported ANI.
“I thank the public of Mandi who voted for me in large numbers,” he told the news agency. “I congratulate BJP candidate Kangana Ranaut for winning Mandi Lok Sabha seat…The arrival of PM [Narendra] Modi, Yogi Adityanath and Nitin Gadkari had an impact on polls.”
However, with Congress winning four Assembly seats in bye-elections, Singh said that the people of Himachal Pradesh had made their mandate clear “against attempts to disrupt the Congress government by BJP”.
“BJP is struggling to cross the mark of 250 Lok Sabha seats,” Singh added. “INDIA alliance has performed very well [and] can also form the government by forging alliances.”
Mandi is one of four Lok Sabha seats in the state. The constituency comprises 17 Assembly segments. It was traditionally a Congress stronghold until the BJP’s Ram Swaroop Sharma won the seat in the 2019 general election with 68.75% of the votes.
Polling for the seat this year took place in the seventh and final phase of the election on June 1.
Polling across 542 parliamentary constituencies was held across seven phases between April 19 and June 1. The Lok Sabha has 543 seats and a party or coalition needs 272 seats to form the government.
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