A new leader, first-timer Shankar Lalwani wrested the Indore parliamentary seat with around 4,91,884 votes.
Lalwani had replaced eight-time MP and lok sabha speaker Sumitra Mahajan who had voluntarily stepped away from the race of ticket.
The former Indore Development Authority chairman Lalwani was leading over his nearest rival—Pankaj Sanghvi of Congress by over 5.37 lakh votes and was set for a record win. He is perhaps among the highest margin victory among BJP candidate nationally.
Lalwani has even broken Mahajan’s record already who has won by 4.66 lakh votes in year 2014. His win ushers in a fresh leadership in Indore BJP which till now was bifurcated between Mahajan and BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya for years.
Meanwhile, Lalwani initially was not considered a winning candidate with her lack of experience against Congress’s Pankaj Sanghvi who had been in mainstream politics for decades and even had lost narrowly against Mahajan in 1998.
It was also uncertain how much support the rookie can draw from Mahajan and Vijayvargiya camps. Mahajan’s possible inclination was important for Lalwani, a prominent Sindhi community leader, as Mahajan holds sizable sway on Marathi community which is an important faction of voters in Indore.
However, it seems a strong Modi wave saw Lalwani through without any trouble whatsoever. Lalwani was among those who had went to meet Mahajan after she had announced not to contest lok sabha poll.
Mahajan had been an MP in Indore since 1989 when she defeated former Chief Minister Prakash Chandra Sethi.
An election rally of PM Narendra Modi in favour of Lalwani at Indore seems to have done the trick for him while Priyanka Gandhi’s though drew sizable crowd in the city but failed to turn the crowd into votes.
