In Kairana, Ganna wins over Jinnah

In Kairana, the victory was ultimately for Ganna over Jinnah. The BJP lost the Lok Sabha seat to a candidate from the RLD who was backed by the Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party.

In the run up to the campaign, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister, Yogi Adityanath invoked Jinnah, but the same was countered by RLD leader, Jayant Chowdhary, who said that in this belt it was Gonna (sugarcane) that mattered and not Jinnah.

The election at Kairana also saw the coming together of the Muslim and Jat votes after the Muzzafarnagar riots. It became clear that the people of Kairana rejected the politics of polarisation among communal lines.

In 2014, the BJP had won this seat by a margin of 2.14 lakh votes. Both in 2014 as well as the 2017 assembly elections, the BJP was backed heavily by the Jats. With the Jats and Muslims backing the RLD candidate fielded by a joint opposition, the party would have to re-think its strategy. The party it may be recalled and recently lost the by-elections at Gorakhpur and Phulpur, the two seats it had won in 2014.