New Delhi: The counting of votes for the bypolls to 46 Assembly seats in 13 states and in the Lok Sabha segments of Nanded in Maharashtra and Wayanad in Kerala, a crucial electoral exercise since the parliamentary polls in April-May, will begin at 8am Saturday.
Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is making her poll debut from Wayanad, a seat that was earlier represented in the Lok Sabha by her brother, Rahul Gandhi.
Elaborate arrangements have been made for the counting of the votes polled in the three bypolls in Kerala — Wayanad Lok Sabha and the Palakkad and Chelakkara Assembly seats. In Wayanad, Priyanka Gandhi was pitted against Communist Party of India (CPI) veteran Sathyan Mokeri and BJP’s Navya Haridas.
The Assembly bypolls were held in nine seats in Uttar Pradesh, seven seats in Rajasthan, six seats in West Bengal, five seats in Assam, four seats each in Punjab and Bihar, three seats in Karnataka, two seats each in Madhya Pradesh and Kerala and one seat each in Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Uttarakhand and Meghalaya.
The Meerapur, Kundarki, Sisamau, Katehari, Phulpur, Majhawan, Ghaziabad, Karhal and Khair seats went to bypolls in the crucial political battleground of Uttar Pradesh November 20. While the results will not directly impact the composition of the 403-member state Assembly, the contest is being seen as the first major face-off between the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its political rivals since the Lok Sabha election.
The BJP and the opposition parties have accused each other of election malpractices.
While Samajwadi Party (SP) president Akhilesh Yadav has exuded confidence that the bypoll results will be favourable for his party, Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya has asserted that the BJP will emerge as a clear winner.
In the 2022 Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls, the BJP won the Phulpur, Ghaziabad, Majhawan and Khair seats, while the SP secured victories in Sisamau, Katehari, Karhal and Kundarki. The Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), which was an SP ally then, won the Meerapur seat. The party has since switched sides and is now a part of the BJP-led NDA.
While the Congress did not contest the bypolls, it extended support to the SP. The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) contested all nine seats independently, while Asaduddin Owaisi’s All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) fielded candidates in Ghaziabad, Kundarki and Meerapur. The Aazad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram), led by Chandrashekhar Azad, also contested all seats except Sisamau.
A three-tier security arrangement has been put in place for the counting of the votes cast in the seven Assembly bypolls in Rajasthan, an official said Friday.
The Jhunjhunu, Ramgarh, Dausa, Deoli-Uniara, Khinvsar, Salumbar and Chaurasi seats went to bypolls in the desert state November 13.
Bypolls were held in the Gidderbaha, Dera Baba Nanak, Chabbewal (reserved for Scheduled Caste candidates) and Barnala Assembly seats in Punjab Wednesday. The bypolls were necessitated after the incumbent legislators were elected to the Lok Sabha.
The contest in Punjab is being seen as a litmus test for the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, whose government has completed two years and a half in office. The Congress and the BJP are the two other main contenders.
Karnataka witnessed a fierce fight between the ruling Congress and a combative BJP-JD(S) alliance in the bypolls to the Sandur, Shiggaon and Channapatna Assembly segments November 13.
A good show by the Congress will be seen as an endorsement for both Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and his deputy D K Shivakumar, while a solid performance by the BJP would mean the silencing of its state president B Y Vijayendra’s critics within the saffron organisation fold.
For JD(S) leader H D Kumaraswamy, it will be a battle of prestige as his son Nikhil is testing his electoral fortunes from Channapatna after tasting defeats in earlier contests. Kumaraswamy vacated the seat after being elected to the Lok Sabha.
Counting of votes will also be taken up for the Raipur City South Assembly bypoll in Chhattisgarh. Polling was held on November 13. The ruling BJP and main opposition Congress were locked in a direct fight in the seat, where the bypoll was necessitated after incumbent BJP MLA Brijmohan Agrawal’s election to the Lok Sabha.
The Sitai, Madarihat, Naihati, Haroa, Medinipur and Taldangra Assembly segments in West Bengal went to bypolls on November 13. Five of these constituencies are in the Trinamool Congress (TMC) stronghold of south Bengal, while Madarihat remains a BJP bastion in the northern parts of the state. The bypolls were necessitated after the incumbent MLAs were elected to the Lok Sabha.
The CPI(M)-led Left Front and the Congress contested the bypolls separately for the first time since 2021.
Kedarnath in Uttarakhand also went to bypolls November 20. The Assembly seat in Rudraprayag district fell vacant after the death of BJP MLA Shaila Rani Rawat in July.
Bypolls were also held in the Dholai, Sidli, Bongaigaon, Behali and Samaguri Assembly segments in Assam, Tarari, Ramgarh, Imamganj and Belaganj in Bihar, Vav in Gujarat, Vijaypur and Budhni in Madhya Pradesh and Gambegre in Meghalaya.
PTI
