Gorakhpur-Faizabad MLC Result 2026: Decision Near on Second Preferences — BJP's Dhruv Tripathi Leads Independent Rajeev Yadav by 901 After 12 Eliminations

Of all 11 Legislative Council seats in Uttar Pradesh, this is the one where every vote is being fought over. Nobody came close to the quota on first preferences, so the seat is being decided the slow way: by eliminating the lowest-placed candidates one at a time and moving each of their ballots to the next preference marked on it. After 12 eliminations, the BJP's Dhruv Tripathi — who won this seat in 2020 as an independent and is now the BJP's candidate — is narrowly ahead of independent Rajeev Yadav. At one stage the gap between them was just 224 votes.

First preferences vs the count now

First-preference figures as reported by AajTak; second-preference figures as reported by Janwarta. "Gained from transfers" is our calculation. Sixteen candidates were in the race, so four remain after 12 eliminations; the reports did not list the votes of the other remaining candidates.

How the seat will be decided

The quota is half of the 40,811 valid votes plus one — 20,406. Dhruv Tripathi needs about 7,400 more votes to reach it and Rajeev Yadav about 8,300. Neither can get there from the small candidates' ballots, so the decisive transfer is the one still to come: the ballots of the SP's Dr Sanjayan Tripathi, who had 8,301 first-preference votes.

• If SP voters marked Rajeev Yadav second in large numbers, the independent could overturn the 901-vote gap.
• If their second preferences split or went unmarked, Dhruv Tripathi's lead is likely to hold. Ballots with no further preference are set aside as "exhausted".
• Under the counting rules, eliminations continue until a candidate reaches the quota or only one candidate remains in the count.

To speed things up, officials increased the number of counting tables for the transfers from one to three, according to Janwarta. Our explainer on how MLC votes are counted walks through the process step by step.

A disputed count

• SP boycott: SP candidate Dr Sanjayan Tripathi boycotted the count, alleging that the trend changed suddenly after the third round of first-preference counting. His allegations have not been verified.
• Complaint against the Returning Officer: Independent candidate Ajay Singh, backed by an association of unaided-school teachers, reportedly filed a complaint alleging that the Returning Officer was favouring the BJP.
• Official removed: An additional commissioner from Ayodhya was taken off counting duty after a complaint; the administration said counting was being done according to the rules.
• Ballot boxes: Objections were raised over a box from Mau that held 52 more ballots than recorded at sealing, and a box from Deoria was found with a broken seal on Tuesday.

Why this seat matters

It is the only one of the 11 seats where an independent is still in contention. If Dhruv Tripathi holds on, the BJP would win a seat that he first won as an independent in 2020. If Rajeev Yadav overtakes him on transfers, it would be the first independent win of this election. See the full UP MLC scoreboard and our first-round report.