On Thursday, December 8, for the first time, the Rampur Sadar assembly seat has been won by a Hindu candidate. BJP candidate Akash Saxena inflicted a crushing defeat on Samajwadi Party candidate Mohammed Asim Raja, breaching the stronghold of SP’s controversial leader Azam Khan. The historic feat has been achieved after 70 years and 20 assembly elections.
Akash Saxena received 80964 votes, accounting for 61.95% of the total votes cast. Asim Raja of the SP had to settle for 47262 votes.
After the results were announced, the Samajwadi candidate blamed the Rampur police for his defeat. While speaking to local media, Asim Raja claimed that 70% votes were stolen in the bypoll. He alleged that the Rampur police forcibly stopped people from voting. “Elections were held in Rampur on December 5, and we had previously stated that elections had not taken place in Rampur,” he said.
रामपुर : भाजपा प्रत्याशी आकाश सक्सेना की जीत निश्चित सपा प्रत्याशी आसीम राजा ने कहा हम हारे तो रामपुर पुलिस को यह जीत मुबारक।
— Anaadi TV UP (@anaadi_up) December 8, 2022
खाकी के लोगो ने दंडडो से वोटरों को वोट डालने नही दजिये है।
रामपुर पुलिस ने कैप्चर किया चुनाव। #Rampur @samajwadiparty @yadavakhilesh pic.twitter.com/Dnoqj47Gzb
The SP candidate also accused police of booth capturing. “Police did not allow Rampur residents to vote in any of the city’s 200 polling stations. Booths have been looted. Only 20% of the vote was cast in 252 polling places. All of the booths outside of the city and village were captured. There has been 50-70-80% voting. All the booths were captured. 2.25 lakh voters were denied the right to vote. Only 45,000 votes were cast, and many of them were cast by police officers. The counting has begun. However, in the city where the SP had a stronghold, where the total vote was 70%, they were not allowed to vote,” Asim Raja claimed.
However, no such cases have been reported and elections were held peacefully.
Notably, Bypoll on the Rampur Sadar seat was necessitated after Azam Khan was sentenced to three years in jail in a hate speech case, and consequently disqualified as MLA. Due to his conviction, Azam Khan cannot contest elections for the next 6 years.
