Patna: Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) has secured five assembly seats in the Bihar elections.
With a strong election campaign, especially in the Muslim-dominated Seemanchal region, the party is contesting 29 of the 243 assembly seats.
Twenty-four of the seats it is contesting are in the Seemanchal region.
Md. Sarwar Alam secured victory from the Kochadhaman constituency with 81,860 votes, defeating Rashtriya Janata Dal’s (RJD) Mujahid Alam by a margin of 23,02 votes.
Party candidate, Md. Tauseef Alam, who was contesting from the Bahadurganj constituency has won with 87315 votes and a margin of 28726 votes, defeating Mohammed Masawar Alam of the Indian National Congress.
From the Jokihat constituency, AIMIM’s Mohammad Murshid Alam won with 83,737 votes and a margin of 28,803, against Manzar Alam of the Janata Dal (United).
Baisi candidate, Ghulam Sarwar, won with 92,766 votes, holding a margin of 27,251, against his BJP’s Vinod Kumar.
The party’s Thakurganj candidate Ghulam Hasnain, however, has faced defeat
Overall, the ruling NDA appeared to register a landslide victory, opening up impressive leads in more than 180 seats, with early trends also indicating that the BJP was on track to post its biggest tally with an excellent strike rate.
The AIMIM fought the elections independently, without joining either of the ruling or opposition coalitions.
The tally is likely to change with several rounds of counting still left.
“I want to thank the people of Bihar for voting for AIMIM. I also want to congratulate all our candidates and party workers in these five seats for working so hard,” Owaisi said.
He added that the party “accepts the mandate of the people of Bihar” and assured that AIMIM would work for the welfare of the Seemanchal region.
Owaisi also thanked Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar. Targeting the RJD, he reiterated his longstanding claim that “RJD cannot stop the BJP,” adding that voters were “misled on the M-Y (Muslim-Yadav) combination.” He appealed to people “not to vote for fascist forces.”
Without naming the Mahagathbandhan, he said they need to introspect on why they failed to stop the BJP.
Urging them to do the course correction, he said merely cursing AIMIM will not help.
He rubbished the statement of Samajawadi Party leader Akhilesh Yadav, blaming SIR for the defeat in Bihar.
“You need to see your weaknesses. First of all, you have to be humble. If you think we are raja and voters are our praja, those days have gone,” he said.
The AIMIM chief hailed the victory of Congress candidate Naveen Yadav in the Jubilee Hills by-election. He said Chief Minister Revanth Reddy called him and thanked him for his party’s support.
Terming this as a big victory after the 2023 elections, Owaisi hoped that CM Revanth Reddy would do more to improve infrastructure and civic amenities in Jubilee Hills and the rest of Hyderabad and Telangana.
He defended the stand taken by the party and pointed out that the vote share of the BRS was falling.
(With inputs from agencies.)
