A leader in the record books
Paswan won his debut Lok Sabha poll in 1977 with a record margin of 424,000 votes
Patna: Indian Dalit politician Ram Vilas Paswan has been contesting the Hajipur Lok Sabha seat in Bihar since 1977, and except for occasional defeats, he emerged victorious from most of the time.
He has held the seat eight times — of them four times in a row from 1996 to 2004.
Paswan became an international hero in his LS poll debut in 1977 when he won the elections with a record margin of 424,000, sending him to the Guinness World Records.
In between 1977 and 2014 when the last general elections were held, he lost his elections only thrice — in 1984 when he was defeated by Congress candidate Ram Ratan Ram during the massive sympathy wave in the aftermath of assassination of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, 1991 and 2009.
He faced the last two defeats at the hands of Ram Sundar Das, a socialist leader who died in 2015.