Year Ender 2024: Biggest Upsets In Lok Sabha Elections 2024

The Bharatiya Janata Party's ambitious campaign slogan 'Ab ki baar, 400 paar' failed to materialize as the 2024 Lok Sabha election results left the party below the majority mark of 272 seats.

The BJP, which secured 303 seats in 2019, saw its tally reduced to 240, necessitating the support of allies like Chandrababu Naidu's Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and Nitish Kumar's Janata Dal (United) to form the government for a third consecutive term.

Decline in Strongholds

The BJP's performance saw a significant dip in constituencies where it previously dominated. The party won only 155 seats with a 50% or higher vote share, a sharp drop from the 224 such seats in 2019. However, the BJP still maintained its edge with 64% of its victories being secured by large margins-more than any opposition party, accoriding a report in The Print.
Major Upsets in Key Constituencies

Several high-profile losses marked the 2024 elections:

• Amethi: Smriti Irani, the BJP incumbent, lost to Congress veteran KL Sharma by over 1,67,196 votes, reclaiming a traditional Congress bastion.
• Thiruvananthapuram: BJP minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar lost to Congress MP Shashi Tharoor by 16,000 votes.
• Tamil Nadu: BJP state chief K. Annamalai was defeated by DMK's Ganapathy Rajkumar by more than 1,18,068 votes.
• Jammu & Kashmir: Mehbooba Mufti of the Peoples Democratic Party lost to Mian Altaf Ahmad of the National Conference by 2.81 lakh votes, while Omar Abdullah of the National Conference was defeated by independent candidate Abdul Rashid Sheikh by over 2 lakh votes.
• Jharkhand: BJP minister Arjun Munda lost to Congress' Kali Charan Munda by 1,49,675 votes.
• West Bengal: Congress veteran Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury was defeated by Yusuf Pathan of the same party in a surprising intra-party upset by over 85,000 votes.
• Haryana: Congress' Raj Babbar lost to BJP's Rao Inderjit Singh in Gurgaon by a margin of 75,000 votes.
• Uttar Pradesh: BJP candidate Maneka Gandhi lost the Sultanpur seat to Samajwadi Party's Rambhual Nishad by 43,174 votes.
• Chhattisgarh: Former Congress CM Bhupesh Baghel lost to BJP's Santosh Pandey by more than 44,000 votes.

Allies Back in the Fold

The BJP managed to hold onto power by renewing ties with estranged allies like the TDP and JD(U), highlighting the shifting dynamics of coalition politics in India.

These election results underscore a changing political landscape, with regional and opposition parties making significant inroads against the BJP's previously unassailable dominance.