Months before the 2027 state assembly polls, the elections to 11 Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council graduate and teachers’ constituency seats turned into a setback for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in its strongholds of Varanasi and Lucknow, besides witnessing a close contest in Gorakhpur, even as the ruling party won six seats overall, while the Samajwadi Party got a shot in the arm as it bagged five seats.
The SP had won three seats and independent candidates secured two seats six years ago. In the results announced on Wednesday, the BJP’s tally of six was the same as in the 2020 Legislative Council election.
The BJP won the Gorakhpur-Faizabad teachers’ seat in the region, considered chief minister Yogi Adityanath’s stronghold, by a narrow margin. Uttar Pradesh deputy chief minister Brajesh Pathak said, “BJP workers reached out to voters across the state and have won seats. Guess how many seats Congress won?
However, the defeat of the party candidates in the strongholds of Varanasi, Lucknow, Jhansi, and the Agra region came as a cause for concern. The BJP drew solace from its performance in west Uttar Pradesh, where the party retained the Meerut graduate and teachers’ seats, with its candidates Dinesh Kumar Goyal and Shrichand Sharma securing victories. The INDIA alliance uses false rhetoric when they get defeated. He described the BJP’s performance in the MLC elections as a significant setback. Elections were held using ballot papers.
In the Meerut teachers’ constituency, Shrichand Sharma (BJP) won with a total of 18,099 votes. In the Meerut graduate constituency, the winner Dinesh Kumar Goyal secured 24,929 votes, according to an official press release from the office of the Uttar Pradesh chief electoral officer. BJP candidate Dr Hari Singh Dhillon retained the Bareilly-Moradabad division teachers’ seat, polling 21,672 votes, the press release said. In Varanasi, represented by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the Lok Sabha, the SP retained both the graduate and teachers’ seats that it had won in 2020. BJP is going to form the third consecutive government in the state with full majority (after the 2027 UP assembly polls. Earlier reporting noted: PM Modi taunts Congress for dismal show in MLC polls despite use of paper ballots Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday (October 28, 2026) taunted the Congress party for its dismal show in the MLC elections despite the use of paper ballots, a key demand of Opposition parties in their campaign against EVMs. Earlier reporting noted: The Congress drew a blank in Karnataka while the BJP won five Legislative Council seats in Uttar Pradesh and the Samajwadi Party three as results were announced on Wednesday (October 28) for the biennial elections held in 28 Upper House Constituencies across four States. Earlier reporting noted: “MLC elections in 28 seats across 4 big States — Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Bihar and Karnataka.
Uttar Pradesh deputy chief minister Keshav Prasad Maurya said the BJP had largely repeated its previous performance but conceded that the party had hoped to win more seats. UP Congress in-charge Rajendra Pal Gautam, reacting from Delhi, congratulated the winning SP candidates and said the results showed the INDIA bloc’s support for the Samajwadi Party. PM Modi said in a post on ‘X’.
