Congress leader Chaudhary Lal Singh on Tuesday lost the Basohli Assembly seat in Jammu and Kashmir by 16,034 votes to Darshan Kumar of the Bharatiya Janata Party, according to data from the Election Commission.

Kumar won the seat with 31,874 votes while Singh, a former minister in the Jammu and Kashmir Cabinet, secured a total of 15,840 votes.

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In the 2014 Assembly polls, Singh won the Basohli seats after switching from the Congress to the BJP. He rejoined the Congress in March, just ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.

In 2018, Singh, who was a state minister in the coalition government consisting of the BJP and the People’s Democratic Party, stirred controversy by attending a rally in support of the accused persons in the rape and murder of a minor Muslim girl in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kathua district.

Singh had defended his participation in the rally at the time, saying that he was there to defuse the situation.

In September, a group of former civil servants criticised the Congress for fielding Singh in the Assembly elections.

In a letter to Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge, the Constitutional Conduct Group said that Singh’s nomination “defied explanation that a party which has taken on itself the mantle of leading the fight against the politics of hate” should choose as its candidate a person who “represented the worst aspects of the politics of hate promoted by the Sangh Parivar”.

At 2.45 pm, the Congress had won three seats and was ahead in three others as the counting of votes for the Assembly elections was underway. Its ally, the National Conference, had won 21 seats and was ahead in 20 constituencies.

The BJP had been declared the winner in 17 seats and was leading in 12.

The People’s Democratic Party had won two seats and was leading in two constituencies.

The Legislative Assembly in Jammu and Kashmir has a strength of 119 members. While elections took place in 90 constituencies, 24 more seats are designated for areas that are in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. The lieutenant governor has the power to appoint five members. Therefore, a party or an alliance needs 48 seats for a majority when the House has 95 members.

The Assembly polls in Jammu and Kashmir took place in three phases on September 18, September 25 and October 1. A voter turnout of 63.8% was recorded.

Most exit polls on Saturday projected the National Conference-Congress alliance to be ahead of the BJP.

The Assembly polls in Jammu and Kashmir were the first in 10 years, and the first since the abrogation of Article 370 of the Constitution in August 2019, which gave special status to the erstwhile state. The Centre had also bifurcated the state into two Union territories: Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh.

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