New Delhi, May 24 : The number of Muslim MPs in the Lok Sabha has increased to a decade high of 27, up from 23 last time, with a dozen of them winning from Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal even as none of the six Muslim candidates fielded by BJP tasted victory.
Registering an emphatic win, BJP-led NDA has won the general elections with a thumping majority and the party alone has won 303 seats.
National Conference leader Farooq Abdullah, AIMIM’s outspoken chief Asaduddin Owaisi and Samajwadi Party’s Azam Khan are among the high profile Muslim candidates who have won the polls.
Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, which have considerable Muslim population, have six candidates each from the community to the Lok Sabha. Kerala and Jammu & Kashmir have three Muslim MPs each while Assam and Bihar have two each.
There is one MP each from the community from Punjab, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Lakshadweep and Telangana.
Among the political parties, Trinamool Congress has five Muslim MPs, followed by four of Congress. There are three Muslim MPs each from Samajwadi Party, Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), National Conference and Indian Union Muslim League (IUML).
AIMIM has sent two Muslim MPs, including party chief Owaisi, while there is one Muslim MP each from Ram Vilas Paswan-led LJP, Sharad Pawar’s NCP, CPI(M) and perfume baron Badruddin Ajmal’s party AIUDF, as per latest data from the Election Commission.
Nearly 20 per cent of the country’s 130 crore population are Muslims.
The outgoing Lok Sabha, the 16th one, has 23 Muslim MPs, the most being from Congress and Trinamool Congress.
The previous 14th and 15th Lok Sabha had 30 and 34 Muslim MPs, respectively, when Congress-led UPA was in power.
In 1980, the Lok Sabha had the maximum number of Muslim MPs at 49.
In 1984 when Rajiv Gandhi swept to power following the assassination of his mother and then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, there were 42 Muslim MPs in the Lok Sabha.
The lowest number of Muslim MPs were in 1952 when there were just 11 in the Lower House.
In the latest Lok Sabha polls, ruling BJP fielded six Muslim candidates – three from Jammu and Kashmir, two from West Bengal and one from Lakshadweep. But none could win the elections.
Recording his fourth straight Lok Sabha win, Owaisi won the Hyderabad seat in Telangana by a margin of 2.82 lakh votes. His party candidate Imtiaz Jaleel Syed, a former journalist, won by 4,492 votes from Aurangabad constituency in Maharashtra.
In Bihar, BJP’s ally LJP fielded Choudhary Mehbhoob Ali Kaiser from Khagaria and he won the seat by a margin of over 2.48 lakh votes. AIUDF chief Badruddin Ajmal (AIUDF) retained his traditional seat of Dhubri in Assam, by a margin of 2.26 lakh votes.
NCP’s Mohd Fazal emerged winner in the Lakshadweep seat with just 823 votes.
Congress, which has won 52 seats, saw four of its Muslim candidates emerging victorious — Mohd Jawed from Bihar’s Kishanganj, Mohd Sadiq from Faridkot in Punjab, Abu Hasem Khan Chowdhury from West Bengal’s Maldaha South and Abdul Khaleque from Barpeta in Assam.
Trinamool Congress’s winning Muslim candidates include Tollywood star Nusrat Jahan Ruhi who won from Basirhat by a margin of 3.5 lakh votes over her nearest BJP rival.
Also making it to Lok Sabha from the party are Afrin Ali from Arambagh, Khalil-ur-Rahaman from Jangipur, Abu Tahar Khan from Mursibadad and Sajda Ahmed from Uluberia.
Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan, who courted controversy during the poll campaign with his sexist remarks against BJP rival Jayaprada, won from the Rampur seat in Uttar Pradesh by nearly 1.09 lakh votes. Party candidates S T Hasan Moradabad and Shafiqur Rehman from Sambhal emerged victorious.
Candidates of BSP, an ally of SP, won from Amroha, Ghazipur and Saharanpur. Local don Mukhtar Ansari’s brother Afzal Ansari defeated Telecom Minister Manoj Sinha from Ghazipur in eastern Uttar Pradesh by a margin of over 1.19 lakh votes.
Danish Ali won from Amroha and Haji Fazlur Rehman won from Saharanpur.
In Kerala, IUML — an ally of Congress — won two seats. P K Kunhalikutty emerged winner from Malappuram and E T Mohammad Basheer from Ponnani seat.
The party’s candidate — K Navas Kani — won from Ramanathapuram in Tamil Nadu.
CPI(M)’s candidate A M Ariff won the Alappuzha seat in Kerala, where the Left front lost all other seats.
In Jammu and Kashmir, Abdullah has retained the Srinagar seat defeating BJP candidate by 70,050 votes.
His party National Conference’s Hasnain Masoodi won the Anantnag seat by 6,676 votes and Mohd Akbar Lone bagged the Baramulla seat by over 30,000 votes.
Congress candidate Mohammad Sadique won the Faridkote seat in Punjab by a margin of 83,256 votes. The party’s candidate in Bihar Mohammad Jawed bagged the Kishanganj seat by 34,466 votes, while Abu Hasem Khan Chowdhury won by 8,222 votes from Maldah Dakshin in West Bengal.
The party’s candidate Abdul Khaleque won from Barpeta seat in Assam. His victory margin was 1.4 lakh votes.
