Baghpat, Uttar Pradesh:
Ajit Singh, chief of the Rashtriya Lok Dal, has lost in Baghpat, western Uttar Pradesh, a seat he had been winning straight since 1999 and had lost only once before. His loss tells the story of elections 2014.
The union aviation minister in the UPA government has lost to the
BJP's Satyapal Singh, who quit as Mumbai police commissioner to contest the elections.
The BJP is leading in 54 seats in Uttar Pradesh, powering the party's magnificent performance across the country. It had won only 10 of the state's 80 seats five years ago
The BJP's UP strategy was scripted by Narendra Modi's chief aide Amit Shah, who galvanised cadres that had been in disarray for years and played drew on the state's historical electoral dynamics like the caste factor.
In western UP, the region where Ajit Singh has lost, Mr Shah played on communal polarisation. In a region recently scarred by deadly communal violence, he fielded three party leaders named in riot cases and made an incendiary speech in Muzaffarnagar, the epicentre of the riots, earning a temporary ban from campaigning from the Election Commission.
Ajit Singh is a Jat leader. His vote bank was seen to shift
en masse to the BJP after the Muzaffarnagar riots.