New Delhi: The political prowess they inherited seems to have been rendered ineffective as sons of famous politician fathers headed towards a debacle in the 17th Lok Sabha elections.
From former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s son and Congress president Rahul Gandhi losing out on the party’s political bastion in Amethi, to Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot’s son Vaibhav, who lost in Jodhpur, the current generation of political dynasts have clearly not lived up to their predecessors’ success.
Rahul was left far behind by BJP’s Smriti Irani by over 40,000 votes. Vaibhav lost by a margin of over 2.7 lakh votes to BJP’s Gajendra Singh Shekhawat.
Also losing his stronghold over Madhya Pradesh’s Guna constituency is Congress’ Jyotiraditya Scindia, son of former Union Minister Madhav Rao Scindia. At the time of writing this report Jyotiraditya was trailing by over 1,20,000 votes. The Congress has been in power in the seat since 1999.
In Rajasthan’s Barmer, Manvendra Singh, son of Jaswant Singh, founding member of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), lost by over 3.2 lakh votes. He was contesting on a Congress ticket.
In the west, Ajit Pawar’s son Parth, Murli Deora’s son Milind and Shankarrao Chavan’s son Ashok were all trailing from Maval, Mumbai South and Nanded constituencies, respectively in Maharashtra.
NCP’s Parth is lagging by 2,16,349 votes, and Congress’ Milind and Ashok by 1,00,516 and 32,410 votes, respectively.
Down south, Nikhil Kumaraswamy, son of Karnataka Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy is trailing from Mandya by over 1,00,000 votes. Nikhil is contesting on a JD(U) ticket.
PTI