Kota Lok Sabha constituency: Om Birla wins with margin of 41,974 votes

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader and Lok Sabha speaker Om Birla won with a margin of 41,974 votes from Rajasthan's Kota constituency in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Birla won with a total of 7,50,496 votes.

He was contesting against former BJP leader and Congress candidate Prahlad Gunjal.

Birla, an experienced politician, has been the 17th Speaker of the Lok Sabha since June 2019. He was elected as Speaker by defeating Congress candidate Mallikarjun Kharge and represents the Kota-Bundi constituency in Rajasthan as a member of the BJP.

Birla became Speaker after being re-elected to the Lok Sabha for a second term, defeating Congress's Ramnarayan Meena by 2.5 lakh votes.

Before joining the Lok Sabha, Birla served three terms in the Rajasthan Assembly, elected in 2003, 2008, and 2013.

Born on November 23, 1962, in Kota, Rajasthan, Birla started his political career young. He graduated with a BA in political science from Maharshi Dayanand Saraswati University in Ajmer and worked as a farmer and social worker after graduation.

Active in student politics, Birla was the president of the student union at Government Senior Secondary School, Gumanpura, in 1979.

Birla has been with the BJP from a young age. He served as district president of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha, the party's youth wing, for four years, and then as Rajasthan state president for six years, before becoming national vice-president of the All India Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha for another six years.

In the 2019 Lok Sabha election for the Kota constituency, Birl emerged as the winner, receiving a total of 800,051 votes, which accounted for 58.52% of the vote share. His opponent, Ramnarayan Meena of the INC, received 520,374 votes, making up 38.07% of the total votes.

According to the Election Commission, the BJP was leading on 14 Lok Sabha seats in Rajasthan, while Congress was ahead on eight seats.