Smriti Irani To Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Modi Ministers Who Lost Lok Sabha Elections

Several BJP leaders and Union Ministers Smriti Irani, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Ajai Mishra Teni, and Arjun Munda, were trailing in as vote count trends indicated disappointing results for the BJP-led NDA. 

What a big surprise the 2024 Lok Sabha election results turned out, nullifying the Exit Poll results completely the '400-paar' slogan of the saffron camp became a nightmare as the ruling party is continuing to struggle to reach 300 tally. Several BJP leaders and Union Ministers Smriti Irani, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Ajai Mishra Teni, and Arjun Munda, were trailing in as vote count trends indicated disappointing results for the BJP-led NDA. 

Smriti Irani 

Smriti Irani, who had won the Amethi Lok Sabha seat by defeating Rahul Gandhi in 2019, lost to Congress candidate Kishori Lal Sharma, a close aide of the Gandhi family, by over 1.39 lakh votes as of 4 PM. 

Ajay Mishra Teni

Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Ajay Mishra Teni, whose son was arrested in connection with the Lakhimpur Kheri violence in October 2021, trailed the Samajwadi Party's Utkarsh Sharma by over 33,000 votes at 4 PM. The SP contested the Lok Sabha elections in Uttar Pradesh in alliance with the Congress. 

Arjun Munda

In Jharkhand's Khunti Lok Sabha constituency, Union Tribal Affairs Minister and sitting MP Arjun Munda trailed Congress candidate Kalicharan Munda by over 1.28 lakh votes, according to the Election Commission. 

Rajeev Chandrasekhar 

In Kerala's Thiruvananthapuram Lok Sabha seat, Union Minister of State for Electronics and Information Technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar trailed three-time MP Shashi Tharoor of the Congress by over 15,000 votes votes at 4 PM. Chandrasekhar had been leading by over 24,000 votes during the initial hours of counting. 

The BJP appeared to be losing heavily in its strongholds of Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, and Rajasthan, although it was expected to form the government with about 290 seats. On its own, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) appeared to be failing below the majority mark, with leads in 242 seats despite significant gains in Odisha, Telangana, and Kerala, offering some solace to the party after unexpected losses in the Hindi belt. 

The I.N.D.I.A bloc, formed by their common opposition to the BJP and its ideology, was leading in about 230 seats. In the last elections, the BJP had alone secured 303 seats, whole NDA had over 350. 

The final numbers are likely to fall far short of the "400-paar" predictions by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the "370-paar" for the BJP. The exit poll results, which had predicted a thumping majority for the NDA, were contradicted by the actual results.