Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) suffered a crushing defeat in Rajasthan’s Banswara, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi referred to Muslims as 'infiltrators' and 'those who have more children'. The saffron party’s candidate, Mahendrajeetsingh Malviya, lost to Rajkumar Roat of the Bharat Adivasi Party (BAP), by a margin of 2,47,054 votes. This margin of victory is higher than what PM Modi could manage in his Varanasi seat, where he won by 1,52,513 votes.
BAP made its political debut in 2023 during the Rajasthan assembly elections. It split from Gujarat-based Bharatiya Tribal Party (BTP) in 2017. Roat is BAP’s MLA from Chaurasi, who was elected in 2023. The BJP candidate, Mahendrajeetsingh Malviya, was a Congress MLA from Bagidora seat. He resigned from the position of Congress MLA and joined the BJP to contest the Lok Sabha elections from Banswara. BAP won both the bypolls in Bagidora and the Lok Sabha elections in Banswara.
During a rally on April 21, PM Modi had alleged that the Congress manifesto says they will calculate the gold belonging to mothers and sisters, obtain information about it, and then distribute that property to 'infiltrators' and 'those who have more children', in a clear reference to Muslims. He also falsely claimed that former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had said that Muslims have the first right to the country’s assets.
Read our fact check on Modi’s speech.
Nearly 20,000 individuals, including various activists, had collectively penned two separate letters to the Election Commission, urging action against the PM for his comments describing them as disturbing and a direct offence to the sentiments of millions of Constitution-respecting Indian citizens. The Congress had also lodged a complaint with the ECI on April 22, accusing PM Modi of using religion and religious symbols to fuel animosity between communities.
Refusing to send a notice to PM Modi, the ECI four days later sought a reply from Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) President JP Nadda along with Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge on a BJP complaint and asked them to rein in their star campaigners.