Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Chandrabhanu Paswan won the Milkipur bypolls in Uttar Pradesh by a margin of 61,710 votes, confirmed the Election Commission website.
While Paswan polled over 1.46 lakh votes, his nearest rival Samajwadi Party's Ajit Prasad garnered 84,687 votes. Prasad, who had earlier said he was confident of a win for his son, later accused the BJP government of misusing official machinery.
Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Chandrabhanu Paswan won the Milkipur bypolls in Uttar Pradesh by a margin of 61,710 votes, confirmed the Election Commission website.
While Paswan polled over 1.46 lakh votes, his nearest rival Samajwadi Party's Ajit Prasad garnered 84,687 votes. Prasad, who had earlier said he was confident of a win for his son, later accused the BJP government of misusing official machinery.
Milkipur was the only seat the BJP lost in Ayodhya district in the 2022 Assembly polls.
The BSP did not contest the bypoll while the Congress backed its alliance partner SP.
In the early trends Paswan, took a decisive lead over SP's Prasad, by over 61,000 votes after the 29th round of counting for the Milkipur assembly bypoll on Saturday, as per reports.
Paswan gained 1,45,685 votes, while Prasad had polled 84,266 votes, a lead of 61,319 votes.
According to the official website of the Election Commission, after 28 rounds of counting, Paswan (with 1,39,507 votes) was leading Prasad (79,210 votes) by a margin of 60,297 votes.
Santosh Kumar of the Aazad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram) came third in the race with 5,158 votes.
The Milkipur bypoll was necessitated after local MLA Awadhesh Prasad vacated the seat following his Faizabad win in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
The SP fielded his son Ajit Prasad in the bypoll even as BJP opted for a party cadre Paswan, both from the Pasi community.
While the SP was eager to retain the seat it won in the 2022 UP polls, the BJP was determined to avenge its Faizabad loss, which occurred just five months after the high-profile consecration of the Ram temple at Ayodhya.
Winning candidate Chandrabhanu Paswan told PTI that he was grateful to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath for their guidance and support. He also expressed his gratitude to voters.
"We took the welfare programmes and schemes of the double engine BJP government to the people of Milkipur and they supported us," Paswan reportedly said.
"We will not leave any stone unturned for the development of Milkipur," he added.
SP MP Awadhesh Prasad, who had earlier said he was confident of a win for his son, later accused the BJP government of misusing official machinery.
"Officials worked under pressure from the state government," he alleged.
"The BJP has been involved in large-scale irregularities. The Election Commission and observers were informed about them in writing but no action was taken," he said.