Lok Sabha election results 2019: ‘Outsider’ tag hurts Congress’ Kirti Azad as he loses in Dhanbad
During his electoral campaign, Azad tried to brush off his ‘outsider’ image on several occasions, terming himself as Jharkhand’s son of soil.
Dhanbad Congress candidate Kirti Azad, who was tagged as an ‘outsider’ by his political opponents, as well by as a section of his own party members, was finally disapproved by voters, paving way for sitting BJP MP Pashupati Nath Singh’s victory, who hit a hat-trick of wins from the Dhanbad Lok Sabha seat on Thursday.
Singh had received 5,98,558 votes till the tenth round of counting, while Kirti Azad received 2,62,914 votes during the same period.
Ever since his name was announced as the Congress candidate for Dhanbad, Azad had to face severe discontentment from local Congress workers, who were not impressed with the party’s decision to field an ‘outsider’, especially when several local Congress leaders had expected to get a Lok Sabha ticket.
Also read: NDA routs Grand Alliance in Bihar by 39:1, in Jarkhand by 12:2
During his electoral campaign, Azad tried to brush off his ‘outsider’ image on several occasions, terming himself as Jharkhand’s son of soil.
He often compared himself with MS Dhoni and said that there were only two cricketers from Jharkhand who made it to the Indian cricket team.
“Failure to build a connect between Azad and the voters, and his indifferent attitude towards party workers, including those who were in alliance with the Congress, are some of the reasons why he failed to make any impact in Dhanbad,” said professor Prabhat Kumar, a political analyst.
Talking to the media on projection of the results, Pashupati Nath Singh thanked the voters for showing confidence in him as well as the policies of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Singh also thanked the party workers who worked relentlessly to ensure BJP’s victory from Dhanbad.
Kirti Azad did not respond to this reporter’s queries.
Congress district president BP Singh said that the result was unexpected and said the failure to transfer votes may have hurt Congress.
“It seems the leaders of the Grand Alliance failed to get votes transferred to the Congress candidate. A greater analysis of the results is needed,” said Singh.
