Lone Hindu candidate leads 11 Muslims in UP’s Kundarki; BJP may win after 30 years

A Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate in the Uttar Pradesh (UP) Kundarki Assembly seat is leading against 11 contenders from the Muslim community. BJP’s Ramveer Thakur is leading with over 98,000 votes in the Muslim-majority constituency in Uttar Pradesh. If he wins, the BJP will be reclaiming the seat after a gap of 30 years.
Kundarki, a Samajwadi Party stronghold, is among the nine UP Assembly seats where bypolls were conducted along with Vidhan Sabha elections in Maharashtra and Jharkhand.
If Thakur emerges victorious, he would be the first BJP candidate to win the seat in over 30 years. The BJP last won the Kundarki seat in the 1993 UP Vidhan Sabha election, when Chandra Vijay Singh secured victory for the saffron party.
Going by current trends, a victory for BJP’s Ramveer Thakur in Kundarki seems almost certain because of the big lead he has over his nearest rival of the Samajwadi Party (SP).
The BJP’s Ramveer Thakur is leading against SP’s Mohammad Rizwan, with the margin widening as we report. Aazad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram)’s Chand Babu, All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen’s Mohammad Varish and Bahujan Samaj Party’s Rafatullah, are also in the fray.
Kundarki, part of west UP’s Sambhal Lok Sabha seat, has a high concentration of the Muslim population, with 60% of its population belonging to the community.
Administration-wise, Kundarki is part of the Moradabad district.
It’s worth noting that in the Kundarki bypoll, the BJP fielded the sole Hindu candidate among 11 Muslim contenders, while SP’s Mohammad Rizwan, with nearly 40 years of political experience, was the INDIA bloc’s pick.
Rizwan first won from Kundarki in 2002 but lost to the BSP’s Akbar Husain in 2007. However, he made a strong comeback, securing consecutive wins in 2012 and 2017.
Kundarki has been considered an SP stronghold, but the potential of the BJP breaking into the fortress must come as a big setback for SP chief Akhilesh Yadav.
However, after multiple reports of poll malpractices and the police trying to keep some voters from polling at Kundarki, SP chief Akhilesh Yadav accused the Uttar Pradesh Police of unlawfully checking voter cards and Aadhaar IDs. He urged the poll body to take action based on complaints on its official social media accounts about some communities being prevented from voting.
The Samajwadi Party candidate, Mohammad Rizwan, had on the day of voting on Wednesday (voting day) demanded repolling at Kundarki, claiming dubious voting and systematic effort to prevent voters of the minority community from casting their votes.
“The BJP wants to win these by-elections not by vote but by ‘khot’. Fearing a defeat, the BJP is pressuring the administration to indulge in foul play,” the SP chief said.
“Since morning the administration and police acted with bias and intimidated our supporters. I request you to cancel the poll and conduct a repolling on the seat. The SP is boycotting the poll due to this rigging,” read Rizwan’s letter to the Election Commission.
The Election Commission of India, in response, asked the Uttar Pradesh government to ensure fair bypolls in the state and suspended at least seven police personnel, including two sub-inspectors, for violating voter guidelines.
Akhilesh Yadav also shared a video of SP candidate Sumbul Rana from Meerapur in Muzaffarnagar district, accusing police personnel of trying to stop people from voting.
The trend now, with 19 out of 32 rounds of counting done, has naturally raised questions about the impending outcome of a BJP win at Kundarki. The high chance of the BJP’s victory could be attributed to the split in Muslim votes that benefited the saffron party’s Singh.
Meanwhile, anti-incumbency sentiments, and reports of factionalism among local leaders, could have gone against the SP.
In the 2024 bypoll, Kundarki also recorded the highest voter turnout among the nine UP Assembly seats where the election was conducted.
Additionally, UP CM Yogi Adityanath’s aggressive campaign seems to have played a significant role. Ramveer Thakur also made every effort to reach out to Muslim voters. BJP’s Muslim wing and leaders campaigned intensively in Kundarki. While campaigning in Kundarki, Chief Minister Adityanath said it takes two hands to clap. Harping on the slogan of ‘Sabka Saath Sabka Vikas’, he sought votes for the BJP candidate, Ramveer Singh.
Experts believe that minority communities vote in full strength and en bloc for the party of choice.
So, a high voter turnout would be seen favourable for the BJP if there’s a Hindu vote consolidation because the minority community would have reached the voting saturation point.
Of UP’s nine Assembly seats, BJP leads in six, SP in two, and ayant Chaudhary’s Rashtriya Lok Dal(BJP’s alliance partner) in one.