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Asaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM delivers in Seemanchal; set to win 5 seats, runner-up in 2 more
Bihar election results: AIMIM has won four seats - Amour, Bahadurganj, Kochadhaman, and Jokihat - and is leading with a margin of over 21,000 votes from Baisi
PURNEA: Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) is headed to win five Seemanchal seats and emerge as the runner-up on two more assembly segments, Balrampur and Thakurganj.
AIMIM had fielded candidates in 14 of the 24 assembly segments in Seemanchal’s four districts.
According to the results declared on the Election Commission of India (ECI) website at 6 pm, AIMIM has won four seats - Amour, Bahadurganj, Kochadhaman, and Jokihat - and is leading with a comfortable margin of over 21,000 votes from Baisi.
AIMIM entered Bihar’s electoral politics in 2015 when it won the Kishanganj seat. In 2020, the party surprised its detractors by winning five seats.
However, the party suffered a significant setback in 2022 when four of its five lawmakers defected to the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD). AIMIM Bihar president Akhtarul Iman, who had won the Amour assembly seat in 2020, was the only one to stay put.
“You can take away our MLAs but not our supporters,” Iman had said at the time.
On Friday, Akhtarul Iman not only retained his seat but the party also repeated its 2020 performance and won five seats.
Iman won the Amour seat with 100,836 votes over the Janata Dal (United) candidate Saba Zafar’s 61,908 votes and Congress candidate Abdul Zalil Mastan’s 52,791 votes.
AIMIM’s Mohammad Murshid Alam, who won from Jokihat, said he had seen the writing on the wall. “The people of Jokihat wanted change, and on November 11, they voted for that change. The result announced on November 14 has confirmed it,” he said, according to news agency PTI.
Murshid Alam secured 83,737 votes and won with a margin of 28,803 votes over the Janata Dal (United)’s Manzar Alam in a four-cornered contest that also saw two brothers Md Sarfaraz Alam and Shahnawaz Alam -- both sons of former minister Tasleemuddin -- contesting against each other on Jan Suraaj Party and RJD tickets, respectively.
In Bahadurganj, AIMIM’s Mohammad Tauseef Alam (who had joined the party from the Congress) won the seat with a clear margin of over 28,000 votes over Congress’s Mohd Masawar Alam.
On Kochadhaman seats, AIMIM’s) Mohammad Sarwar Alam defeated RJD’s Mujahid Alam. In Baisi, AIMIM candidate Ghulam Sarwar is leading over BJP’s Binod Yadav with a margin of 27,000 votes at the end of the 25th of the 26 rounds of counting.
AIMIM supporter Mohammad Nasim said the AIMIM victory proved that the party was grounded.
“We are happy that people have reposed faith in us and at the same time the verdict is a sweet revenge over RJD that had engineered a split in our party in 2022,” he said
To be sure, AIMIM leaders did attempt to persuade the RJD-led Grand Alliance to induct them into the Opposition coalition. But RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav had his reservations and blocked the initiative.
