Bypolls held in 1 Lok Sabha, four assembly seats
The parliamentary seat was in Punjab’s Jalandhar, while the assembly seats were in Odisha’s Jharsaguda, Uttar Pradesh’s Suar and Chhanbey, and Sohiong in Meghalaya
Bypolls to one Lok Sabha and four assembly seats across four states were held on Wednesday, with polling peaceful in most parts amid stray incidents of altercations between party workers. The parliamentary seat was in Punjab’s Jalandhar, while the assembly seats were in Odisha’s Jharsaguda, Uttar Pradesh’s Suar and Chhanbey, and Sohiong in Meghalaya, most of them necessitated by the deaths of sitting legislators.
In Jalandhar, the election was necessitated by the death of Congress MP Santokh Singh Choudhary during the Bharat Jodo Yatra in January, and featured candidates from the AAP, Congress, BJP, and the Shiromani Akali Dal in alliance with the BSP. Election Commission officials recorded a voter turnout of 50% till 5pm. To be sure, turnout percentages generally rise after this time, with those still in queue allowed to complete the casting of their vote. The final turnout is released the next day.
Punjab Congress chief Amrinder Singh Warring said that the party filed a complaint against six AAP MLAs for being present in the constituency despite ECI guidelines which mandate that politicians that do not belong to the area must leave once the campaigning period is over. The AAP denied the allegations.
The AAP candidate is former MLA Sushil Rinku, who quit the Congress, while the Congress fielded Santokh Chaudhary’s wife Karamjit Kaur. The BJP candidate is Inder Iqbal Singh Atwal.
In Uttar Pradesh, bypolls were held to the assembly seats of Suar and Chhanbey, the first a crucial seat in Rampur district that was declared vacant after a Moradabad court sentenced Abdullah Azam Khan, the son of senior SP leader Azam Khan to two years in jail in May, leading to his disqualification from the assembly.
The primary candidates in the seat are Anuradha Chauhan of the SP, and Shafeek Ahmed Ansari of the Apna Dal (Sonelal), which is a BJP ally. According to the poll body, the provision turnout was 44.95%. The Chhanbey seat in Mirzapur fell vacant after the death of Apna Dal (Sonelal) MLA Rahul Prakash Kol in February. In Odisha’s Jharsaguda, the provisional turnout for the assembly poll held because sitting MLA and minister Naba Das was shot dead by a police official, was 68.12%. “There was no report of any untoward incident,” Odisha CEO Nikunja Bihari Dhal said. Sohiong in Meghalaya’s East Khasi hills had a provisional turnout of 91.87%.
