Barring a few exceptions, UP proved harsh for many parties' chiefs

The 2019 Lok Sabha elections proved specially unkind to chiefs of various political parties, barring the BJP and the SP, in Uttar Pradesh.

The losers in the state in the 2019 poll included not merely Congress president Rahul Gandhi from Amethi, but also the party's state unit chief Raj Babbar, who lost to BJP's Rajkumar Chahar in Moradabad.

Babbar was fielded from Moradabad instead of Fatehpur Sikri in an apparent bid to make his fight easier. Yet he lost to Chahar by a huge margin of 4,95,065 votes.

The sole seat that the Congress was able to retain was that of its former president Sonia Gandhi's Rae Bareli.

Amongst the high-profile party chiefs who got a drubbing included Rashtriya Lok Dal president Ajit Singh, who lost to BJP's Sanjeev Balyan in Muzaffarnagar. Balyan has since been inducted in Union ministry.

Ajit Singh's son Jayant Chaudhary too was humbled in Baghpat by BJP's Satya Pal Singh.

Another loser among various parties' chiefs included Bahujan Samaj Party's state unit president R S Kushwaha, who contested as an SP-BSP-RLD coalition candidate from Salempur, but lost to Ravinder of the BJP by 1,12,477 votes.

BSP supreme had not contest the Lok Sabha elections this time.

The sole exception to the non-BJP, non-NDA party chiefs winning the 2019 polls was Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav, who managed to win from Azamgarh with a margin of 2,59,874 votes.

Besides, the SP chief, BJP's state unit president Mahendra Nath Pandey was among the rare winners among various party's chiefs. He won for the second time from Chandauli parliamentary constituency.

Yet another exception was Anupriya Singh Patel, the chief of BJP ally Apna Dal (Soneylal), who won from Mirjapur.