None of the above (candidates) or NOTA has scripted history as it became the runner-up in the Indore Lok Sabha constituency. With over 78% vote share in the constituency, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate Shankar Lalwani has won securing over 12 lakh votes (12,23746), registering the biggest victory for any candidate in the recently concluded Lok Sabha elections 2024.
According to official data on ECI’s website, Shankar Lalwani has received 78.54% of the votes polled while NOTA secured the second position with 14% vote share (2,18,355) votes. Bahujan Samaj Party’s candidate Sanjay received 49,277, the third-highest votes (3.29%).
Notably, the Congress, as part of the I.N.D.I. Alliance, had fielded Akshya Kanti Bam from the Indore seat against BJP’s sitting MP Lalwani. Bam had initially filed his nomination papers in the office of the Indore District Collector. However, he later went to the DC’s office along with senior BJP leader and Minister Kailash Vijayvargiya on 29th April and withdrew his nomination. He then joined the BJP.
Following the development, the Madhya Pradesh Congress announced that rather than supporting any other candidates in the fray, they would campaign for NOTA on this seat. Indore voted on 13th May and saw a turnout of around 61.75% of the 25.27 lakh electors exercising their franchise.
For those unversed, NOTA allows voters to reject all the candidates contesting from that constituency. According to the news agency PTI, the Lok Sabha seat in Bihar’s Gopalganj recorded the maximum NOTA votes at 51,660, about 5 percent of the total votes polled in the constituency, other than NOTA backed by Congress in Indore.
Meanwhile, the saffron party which is poised to form government for the third time with their pre-poll alliance, NDA, has swept the state securing all 29 seats of Madhya Pradesh.
