Election Results 2014: AAP is Punjab's X Factor

By Dilip -
When the Aam Aadmi Party fielded candidates on all 13 seats in Punjab, they were unanimously dismissed by the big political parties of the state. Today, the AAP is literally having the last laugh having won four seats in the state, as many as the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), that's part of the state government in Punjab. AAP has picked up an impressive 24.4 percent of the vote share in the process.

Satirist Bhagwant Mann has the highest victory margin in the state at over 2 lakh votes over his nearest rival, SAD's Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa. Sitting MP from the Congress Vijay Inder Singla had to settle for the third spot.

Another giant killer was cardiologist from Patiala, Dr Dharam Vira Gandhi, who relegated the Maharani of Patiala and incumbent Congress MP Preneet Kaur to the third place, beating his closest rival by over 20,000 votes.

Professor Sadhu Singh beat Akali's incumbent MP Paramjit Kaur Goldhanger while Harinder Singh Khalsa defeated Congress' Sadhu Singh in Fatehgarh Sahib. 

Congress' Captain Amarinder Singh, who defeated BJP's Arun Jaitley in Amritsar, said "AAP has done better than we expected. I think the Punjabi is forward looking and they believed what AAP said. We will have to see and introspect. This happened in the past with Punjab People's Party. We will deal with them." (PPP was set up by erstwhile Akali leader and former revenue minister in the Badal government, Manpreet Badal, who's party has now merged with the Congress).

Interestingly, though the Congress tally has fallen to three from eight MPs in 2009, it still retains the highest vote share at 33.1 percent.

Though the AAP contested on 430 seats across India, all its wins have come from Punjab.
http://www.ndtv.com/elections/article/election-2014/election-results-2014-aap-is-punjab-s-x-factor-525713

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