Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate Mukesh Dalal won the Surat Lok Sabha seat in Gujarat without any opposition on Monday. This victory came well before the state’s voting date of May 7 in the third phase of the general elections, marking the first electoral win for any political party in the current polls.
The previous day, the nomination of Congress candidate Nilesh Kumbhani was rejected due to discrepancies in the proposers’ signatures, as determined by the district returning officer. The substitute candidate from the party, Suresh Padsala, also faced rejection of his nomination form.
“Since all candidates who had submitted their nomination forms for the Surat Lok Sabha seat withdrew, Dalal has been declared the winner without contest. The election certificate has been handed over to him,” said district collector and returning officer Sourabh Pardhi in a phone conversation with HT.
The voting for all 26 Gujarat constituencies was originally scheduled for May 7. However, due to the announcement of the result for the Surat seat, the polling will now only be held for 25 seats. The Surat seat has already been won by Mukeshbhai Dalal of the BJP, who was elected unopposed. The filing of nominations for the third-phase elections began on April 15 and ended on April 19. On the last day for withdrawal of nominations, a total of eight candidates, including Pyarelal Bharti of the Bahujan Samaj Party, withdrew from the election.
Additionally, four independent candidates and three nominees from smaller parties also withdrew their nominations. In the midst of these developments, a delegation of Congress leaders met with the chief election commissioner and other election commissioners to express their concerns. They demanded that the election process in Surat be restarted, alleging “wrong and undue influence.” Congress leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi stated that this situation demonstrated a complete disregard for the democratic will of the contestants and proposals, and was a clear example of bad faith and undue pressure.
Singhvi claimed that in Surat, the Congress candidate was proposed by four individuals, but all four suddenly retracted their signatures.
In Surat, the returning officer rejected the nominations of Congress candidates, stating that the nomination forms submitted by Kumbhani and Padsala were dismissed due to apparent discrepancies in the proposers’ signatures. The proposers themselves stated in their affidavits that they did not sign the forms, as mentioned in Pardhi’s order. Khumbhani was unavailable for comment.
Rahul Gandhi, a Congress leader, shared on X, “The true face of the dictator is once again revealed to the nation.”
In response, the BJP’s Patil remarked, “Following such a humiliating defeat in the Surat seat, the Congress should now be concerned about losing their deposits in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.”