The BJP had won the Shamli assembly constituency in Uttar Pradesh in 2017, the party’s Tejendra Nirwal Saini beating nearest rival Pankaj Kumar Malik of the Congress (INC) by a comfortable 29720 votes.
Shamli is one of five assembly constituencies in the Kairana Loksabha Constituency in western Uttar Pradesh. Four out of these were won by the BJP in the last elections, with one, Kairana, being won by the Samajwadi Party.
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Shamli became a new constituency in 2008 as a result of delimitation. It was earlier a part of the Kairana assembly constituency. In 2012, the first election after Shamli came into being as an assembly seat was won by Pankaj Kumar Malik, who had narrowly defeated the Samajwadi Party’s Virendra Singh by 3741 votes.
This part of western UP, dominated by Jat and Muslim voters, was torn by communal riots in 2013. The powerful Jats were seen in the aftermath to shift allegiance from Ajit Singh’s Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) to the BJP. The BJP also consolidated other non-Muslim votes.
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51 of the BJP’s 312 seats in 2017 – an absolute majority in the 403-seat assembly – came from western UP as the party swept the region and the state to set up a government under saffron-robed priest Yogi Adityanath as Chief Minister.
The BJP ousted the Samajwadi Party of Akhilesh Yadav, Yogi’s predecessor as UP Chief Minister. This year, the strongest challenge to the BJP is seen to come from Akhilesh Yadav, who wants the state’s top spot back.
The Samajwadi Party, which had won the 2012 UP assembly elections by winning 224 seats, could get only 47 seats in 2017. It stood second, with Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party coming in at 3 with a dismal 19 seats and the Congress settling for only seven.
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Shamli will vote in the first phase of the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections on February 10, 2022. Votes will be counted on March 10. UP votes in seven phases; 53 constituencies in 11 districts will vote in the first phase.
Quick facts about the Shamli Assembly seat
Name of the assembly constituency, district: Shamli Assembly constituency, Shamli district
Polling date: February 10, 2022
Phase: 1
Sitting MLA, party: Tejendra Nirwal, BJP
Winning candidate, party in 2017: Tejendra Nirwal, BJP
Runner-up name, party 2017: Pankaj Kumar Malik, Congress
Winning margin in 2017: 29720
Top 3 candidates 2017 : Tejendra Nirwa (BJP)l, Pankaj Kumar Malik (Congress), Bijendra Singh (RLD)
Top 3 candidates 2012: Pankaj Kumar Malik (Congress), Virendra Singh (SP), Balbir Singh (BSP)
Lok Sabha constituency: Kairana Lok Sabha constituency.
Research by Ashni
Varghese MV
