Election Results 2019: Smriti Irani defeated Rahul Gandhi and won Amethi by over 55,000 votes
Smriti Irani, who unseated Rahul Gandhi from Amethi, summed up her remarkable success in a quote from the ultra-popular series "Game of Thrones". By defeating the Congress president in his family stronghold, Ms Irani gave the Congress its biggest setback. The party is facing one its lowest turnarounds in its 134-year-old history.
Ms Irani, 43, shared on Instagram, a silhouette image of a direwolf in the backdrop of the moon with a quote from the series ''The North Remembers", the second season premiere of Game of Thrones.
She won the Uttar Pradesh seat by over 55,000 votes and polled a total of 4, 68,514 votes. The BJP not only swept through the "heartland" states in the north and Gujarat, it also made huge gains in West Bengal, Odisha, Maharashtra and Karnataka.
A "Game of Thrones" fan commented, "Queen in the North". Ms Irani's close friend, producer Ekta Kapoor, replied to the Instagram post with heart emoticons.
A post shared by Smriti Irani (@smritiiraniofficial) on
This is not the first time Ms Irani referred to "Game of Thrones" on Instagram. She has shared her Monday and Tuesday blues with memes from the show.
This morning, the just-elected BJP leader thanked her voters and tweeted, "A new morning for Amethi, a new pledge. You placed your trust in development, grateful to Amethi."
Amethi, a dusty, largely rural constituency around 130 km from UP capital Lucknow, has rarely looked beyond the Congress or the Gandhi family.
With Thursday's win, she avenged her 2014 defeat in Amethi. She had managed to reduce Mr Gandhi's winning margin to one lakh that year and continued to visit the town regularly despite her defeat.
"Kaun kehta hai aasmaa me surakh nahinho sakta (who says one can't achieve the impossible)," Smriti Irani quoted a poet Dushyant Kumar in her tweet to assert that nothing was impossible.
Mr Gandhi conceded defeat in Amethi and congratulated his BJP rival. He said he wants Smriti Irani to "keep people's faith and take care of Amethi with love".
"I am happy that Rahul Gandhi has expressed faith in PM Modi's leadership. The people of Amethi have shown their faith in us through their votes and I am thankful to them. Even after I lost the elections in 2014, I worked for the people of Amethi. Now that I have won, I will serve them again," she told news agency ANI.
(With inputs from ANI)