Yusuf to Iqra: 24 Muslim MPs make it to Lok Sabha

New Delhi: Yusuf Pathan, Asaduddin Owaisi, and Iqra Choudhary are among the 24 Muslim MPs who made it to the Parliament after the results of the Lok Sabha were announced on Tuesday. A total of 78 Muslims contested the polls including Indpendents in this elections, as compared to 115 Muslim candidates that contested in 2019.

Cricketer-turned-politician Yusuf Pathan, who succeeded in his political debut, contested on a Trinamool Congress ticket from West Bengal’s Berhampur taking down Congress’s Adhir Ranjan Chowdhary. In Uttar Pradesh, Imran Masood from Congress won the Saharanpur seat with a huge margin of 64,542 votes.

In Kairana, Samajwadi Party’s Iqra Choudhary — one of the youngest parliamentarians — defeated BJP’s Pradeep Kumar by 69,116 votes. Down south, All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen chief Asaduddin Owaisi retained his Hyderabad stronghold defeating Bharatiya Janata Party firebrand leader Madhavi Latha by a wide margin of 3,38,087 votes. In Ladakh, Independent candidate Mohammad Haneefa registered his victory defeating Congress’s Jamyang Tsring Namgyal.

The BJP won 25 out of 26 Lok Sabha seats in Gujarat but its vote share has fallen to 61.86 per cent from 63.11 per cent in the 2019 elections, as per the Election Commission data.

The combined vote shares of the Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the two INDIA bloc partners which contested in 25 constituencies, stood at 33.93 per cent. Of this, Congress’ vote share was 31.24 per cent and the AAP’s 2.69 per cent.