As bypoll results largely favour ruling parties, BJP pulls a surprise in Bengal’s Rejinagar
New Delhi, Oct 9 (IANS) Ruling parties in three states and one Union Territory that went for by-elections are poised comfortably to win as counting comes close to an end on Friday for five Assembly and one Lok Sabha constituencies.
Elections were held on Tuesday for the lone Parliamentary constituency of Nagaon in Assam, while voting took place the same day for the Assembly seats in West Bengal’s Nandigram and Rejinagar; Madurantakam and Dharapuram of Tamil Nadu; and Thattanchavady in the Union Territory of Puducherry.
The Nagaon Lok Sabha seat was vacant after Congress leader Pradyut Bordoloi – who won in 2019 and 2024 – joined the BJP and subsequently won from Dispur in this year’s Assembly elections. The state’s ruling BJP was leading at the time of writing, with its candidate Devasish Sharma ahead with a convincing margin of 1.6 lakh votes over his closest rival.
In Puducherry, the ruling All India N. R. Congress (AINRC) retained the Thattanchavady seat, with Ashok Anand winning here with a margin of 8,482 votes over nearest rival E. Vinayagam of the Congress.
Chief Minister Natesan Rangaswamy vacated this seat to retain Mangalam, which he had won simultaneously in the Assembly elections held earlier this year. As a Congress candidate, he lost from Thattanchavady in 1990, but registered a victory in the election held the next year. In 2006, he won here with a record 90 per cent of the total votes polled.
Since winning in 1991 as a Congress candidate, Rangaswamy retained Thattanchavady till he chose to contest elsewhere beginning in 2011 after breaking out of the Congress and founding the AINRC. He returned, winning again in the 2021 and 2026 general elections.
In Tamil Nadu, while Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay’s Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) was ahead by almost 67,000 votes in Dharapuram at the end of all 23 rounds of counting, it was ahead by close to 58,000 mandates in Madurantakam after 17 of 21 rounds. In the Assembly elections held earlier this year, TVK emerged as the largest single party, forming the government with allies.
In West Bengal, BJP’s Hasi Rani Rath was declared winner by a massive margin of over 1.2 lakh votes, while in Rejinagar the ruling party pulled a surprise with its candidate Shankharavh Sarkar close to victory with a lead of over 75,800 mandates. Muslims in Rejinagar comprise well over 70 per cent, where the controversial Babri Masjid-replica builder and founder of Aam Janata Unnayan Party (AJUP), Humayun Kabir, stepped down to retain Nowda.
He had won from Rejinagar earlier, bagging 51.62 per cent of the total votes polled, but his son Golam Nabi Azad failed to retain it for the AJUP in the subsequent by-election.
Since delimitation and polling held in 2011, the seat has been decided on the basis of demographic divide.
But Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari had predicted the change before the by-election, promising to work for the development of the region.
In the 2011 election, Humayun Kabir, then a Congress candidate, defeated his nearest rival Serajul Islam Mondal of the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP), a Left-Front ally. The seat was retained by the Congress in the 2013 by-election after Kabir switched over to the Trinamool Congress, with Rabiul Alam Chowdhury beating the RSP again. In 2016, Chowdhury again triumphed, this time against Kabir, who contested as an independent.
In the subsequent 2021 polls, the BJP rose to the second position in a significant surge, but lost to Chowdhury, then a Trinamool candidate, by a massive margin of over 68,000 votes.
Shankharavh Sarkar’s comfortable position in Rejinagar at the time of writing suggests that the larger part of the Muslim community has accepted the BJP government as a possible benefactor in the coming days, as observers suggest.
Moreover, the trend of being rendered directionless and mass erosion in parties after losing power has also had its impact, say analysts.
Even the once formidable Trinamool Congress has fragmented after its defeat in the Assembly poll this year and has fared poorly in the by-elections too. In Rejinagar, the Mamata All India Trinamool Congress managed less than 4,000 votes, while the Democratic Trinamool Congress collected a little over 2,000.
In Nandigram, that was once among the principal reasons behind Mamata Banerjee’s 15-year tryst with power, her candidate withdrew from the race while the rival faction got a meagre 853 mandates.
–IANS
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