New Delhi, June 4 (Reuters): Indian opposition leader Rahul Gandhi, mocked by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his supporters for a decade as an entitled dynast, marked a stunning comeback on Tuesday, emerging at the centre of an alliance that made deep inroads into ruling party strongholds. The scion of India’s fabled Nehru-Gandhi political dynasty, he embarked on two cross-country marches against what he called Modi’s politics of hate and fear, giving a jolt of enthusiasm to his Congress party and rehabilitating his own image. Reduced by a Modi landslide to just 52 seats in the 543-member lower house of

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has secured a remarkable third consecutive win in the Varanasi seat, defeating Congress candidate Ajay Rai. This hard-fought victory came with a margin of 1,52,513 votes, a notable decrease from the 4,79,505 votes in 2019 and 3,71,784 votes in 2014. During the last election in 2019, Modi defeated SP’s Shalini Yadav with Congress’ Ajay Rai trailing as the runner-up. Similarly, in 2014, Modi outperformed AAP’s Arvind Kejriwal by a significant margin. Despite the lower victory margin this time, BJP leaders had previously speculated that PM Modi’s win might set a new record in India’s political history.