Gandhinagar (Lok Sabha constituency)

Gandhinagar Lok Sabha constituency is one of the 26 Lok Sabha (lower house of Indian Parliament) constituencies in Gujarat, a state in western India. It first held elections in 1967 and its first member of parliament (MP) was Somchandbhai Solanki of the Indian National Congress (INC). Solanki represented the Indian National Congress (Organisation) party for the next elections in 1971 and was re-elected. In the 1977 election, Purushottam Mavalankar (son of the first Speaker of the Lok Sabha, Ganesh Vasudev Mavalankar) of the Janata Party was elected. Mavalankar was defeated in the next election in 1980 by INC candidate, Amrit Mohanal Patel. G. I. Patel also of the INC was elected in 1984. Since 1989 this constituency has been represented by a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Shankersinh Vaghela won in the 1989 election and the next election saw L. K. Advani elected in 1991. Atal Bihari Vajpayee won this seat in 1996 but chose to resign it so that he could represent Lucknow in Uttar Pradesh. This forced a by-election which was won by Vijay Patel, who defeated film actor Rajesh Khanna (INC), among other candidates. As of 2014 Advani still represented this constituency, having won five consecutive elections since 1998. The most successful party in this constituency is the BJP, whose members had been elected nine times out of the fourteen elections held as of 2014.