BJP leaders who lost Assembly polls win Lok Sabha polls

While two parliament segments Karimnagar and Nizamabad were retained by the BJP, the party bagged two new LS seats in the form of Malkajgiri and Medak.

Karimnagar: In an interesting trend, four BJP leaders, who had contested in the Assembly elections in 2023 and lost, have managed to secure victories in the Lok Sabha polls held just barely six months later.

These were Bandi Sanjay Kumar (Karimnagar), Etala Rajender (Malkajgiri), Dharmapuri Arvind (Nizamabad) and M Raghunandan Rao (Medak). While two parliament segments Karimnagar and Nizamabad were retained by the BJP, the party bagged two new LS seats in the form of Malkajgiri and Medak. Sanjay Kumar had contested from the Karimnagar assembly segment and lost to BRS candidate Gangula Kamakar in 2018. He then contested in the 2019 parliament elections and won. However, in the 2023 Assembly elections, he tried again against Kamalakar but lost once again. Now, he has now retained the MP seat by defeating Congress candidate Velichala Rajender Rao.

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Same is the case of Nizamabad MP Dharmapuri Arvind. Arvind, who was first time elected as MP from Nizamabad segment in 2019 polls, had contested from Korutla assembly segment in 2023, but was defeated by BRS candidate Dr K Sanjay. Arvind however managed to win from the Nizamabad Lok Sabha segment again.

Senior politician and six time MLA Etala Rajender had contested simultaneously from Huzurabad and Gajwel assembly seats in 2023, but lost both seats. However, he shifted to Malkajgiri for the Parliament elections and won.

Raghunandan Rao, who contested in the 2023 assembly polls from Dubbak, lost the sitting MLA seat to BRS candidate Kotha Prabhakar Reddy. However, he has now won the Medak parliament seat, earlier represented by Prabhakar Reddy.