Uttarakhand Assembly elections 2022 results: In CM Dhami, Rawat’s defeat, a tradition lives on

The trend continued in the Thursday results of the Assembly elections as sitting CM Pushkar Singh Dhami and former CM Harish Rawat couldn’t win their respective seats. The giant killers — Congress candidate Bhuwan Chandra Kapri who defeated Dhami, and Mohan Singh Bisht who got better of Rawat — registered their first victory in a Vidhan Sabha election.

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Kapri, Youth Congress leader who is considered close to Rahul Gandhi, defeated Dhami by 6,579 votes from Khatima seat. Known to be a good organiser, Kapri lost the 2017 poll to Dhami by a narrow margin of 2,709 votes. At present, Kapri is the working president of Uttarakhand Congress.

From Lalkuan seat, Harish Rawat faced defeat at the hands of BJP’s first-timer Mohan Singh Bisht (53) by 17,527 votes. Bisht had joined the BJP only in January this year even as he was a Zila Panchayat member from Bachchidharma in Haldwani as an Independent. A transporter, Bisht had also remained the president of Dev Singh Bisht Degree College in Haldwani. According to locals, the main factor that worked for Bisht’s was his intensive door-to-door campaigning and personal rapport with the voters. “From day one, I was sure of winning this seat,” he said.

After the 2017 electoral drubbing when Rawat had lost from two seats (Haridwar Rural and Kichha), this election was very crucial for the former chief minister. In a conversation with The Indian Express before the elections, Rawat admitted that the 2017 results had disheartened him, and put in a little extra focus on his own seat this time.

Meanwhile, many in the party think that this might be the end of the road for 73-year-old Rawat. Talking to the media on Thursday, Rawat accepted the verdict of the people and congratulated the winners.