Yusuf Pathan among Muslim candidates victorious in India elections

As many as 15 Muslim candidates including former Indian batter Yusuf Pathan won the recently concluded India elections.

As per Indian media, The Bharatiya Janata Party will form its third government at the Centre in a row after securing 240 seats – 32 short of a simple majority in the Lok Sabha.

The Congress nearly doubled its 2019 seats tally as it won 99 seats.

As many as 15 Muslim candidates won the Lok Sabha polls so far, including former India cricketer Yusuf Pathan.

Pathan, a 2011 World Cup and 2007 World T20 winning member, defeated Congress veteran Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury in Baharampur.

A total of 78 Muslim candidates were in the fray in the Lok Sabha polls, which is 37 less than 2019 polls, where 115 Muslims candidates contested.

Among the victorious Muslim candidates, Congress’ Imran Masood, who won the Saharanpur seat by a massive margin of 64,542 votes.

Iqra Choudhary, 29, of Samajwadi Party from Kairana, defeated BJP’s Pradeep Kumar by 69,116 votes.

Afzal Ansari won the Ghazipur seat.

AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi retained his Hyderabad by defeating BJP’s Madhavi Latha Kompella by a margin of 3,38,087 votes.

In Ladakh, Independent candidate Mohammad Haneefa secured a victory by a margin of 27,862 votes while another Independent candidate Abdul Rashid Sheikh won from Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK)’s Baramulla seat by bagging 4.7 lakh votes.

In Uttar Pradesh, Samajwadi Party’s Mohibbullah won the Rampur seat, while Zia Ur Rehman won in Sambhal.

Mian Altaf Ahmad of the National Conference won in IIOJK’s Anantnag-Rajouri seat against chief minister Mehbooba Mufti.

In Srinagar NC candidate Aga Syed Ruhullah Mehdi secured 3,56,866 votes.