The counting of votes is currently underway for bypolls held in 13 Assembly seats across seven states, marking the first electoral exercise since the recent Lok Sabha polls. The Lok Sabha elections saw the BJP falling short of a majority, while the opposition bloc, INDIA, gained significant strength.
Polling for the Assembly byelections took place on July 10 across Bihar, West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, and Himachal Pradesh. The seats contested were Raiganj, Ranaghat Dakshin, Bagda, and Maniktala in West Bengal; Dehra, Hamirpur, and Nalagarh in Himachal Pradesh; Badrinath and Manglaur in Uttarakhand; Jalandhar West in Punjab; Rupauli in Bihar; Vikravandi in Tamil Nadu; and Amarwara in Madhya Pradesh. Four of these states are governed by constituents of the INDIA bloc, while the remaining are under BJP or NDA administration.
In West Bengal, the ruling Trinamool Congress, led by Mamata Banerjee, is currently leading in all four seats. The TMC won the Maniktala seat in the 2021 state elections, while the BJP initially secured Raiganj, Ranaghat Dakshin, and Bagda before the BJP MLAs defected to TMC.
In Himachal Pradesh, the election results will determine the fate of several prominent candidates, including Kamlesh Thakur, wife of Chief Minister and Congress leader Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, who is leading in the Dehra constituency against BJP’s Hoshyar Singh. The Congress is also leading in two other seats in the state.
The Manglaur constituency in Uttarakhand is witnessing a tight three-cornered battle following the death of BSP MLA Sarwat Karim Ansari. The BJP is trailing in this Muslim- and Dalit-dominated seat, historically held by either the Congress or the BSP.
Punjab’s Jalandhar West assembly segment is seen as a critical test for Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Bhagwant Mann. In Bihar, the bypoll was necessitated by the resignation of JD(U) MLA Bima Bharti, who left to contest the Lok Sabha elections on an RJD ticket.
In Tamil Nadu’s Vikravandi constituency, the bypoll follows the death of DMK legislator N Pughazhendhi. The contest here involves DMK’s Anniyur Siva, PMK’s C Anbumani, and Naam Tamilar Katchi’s K Abinaya.
The by-election in Madhya Pradesh’s Amarwara assembly seat was triggered by the defection of three-time Congress MLA Kamlesh Shah to the BJP. The main contest is between BJP’s Kamlesh Shah, Congress’s Dheeran Shah Invati, and GGP’s Devraman Bhalavi.
These bypolls are the first since the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, where the BJP won 240 seats—32 short of a majority. The NDA, however, achieved a total of 293 seats, surpassing the halfway mark of 272. The Congress-led INDIA bloc secured 232 seats.
Comments