Big setback for BJP as party loses in all four states
Highlights
- Setback for BJP as party loses bypolls in all four states
- Tejashwi Yadav thanked voters after RJD's win by margin of 36,000 votes in Bochahan Assembly seat
- TMC's Babul Supriyo said, "People have destroyed BJP's ego". He won from Ballygunge seat
Bypoll results 2022 LIVE updates: The counting of votes was held on Saturday for one Lok Sabha and four assembly seats. Bengal's Ballygunge, Chhattisgarh's Khairagarh, Bihar's Bochahan, and Maharashtra's Kolhapur North were the four assembly constituencies that went to polls. Meanwhile, one Lok Sabha seat was West Bengal's Asansol.
The bypolls held on April 12 were perhaps the most keenly watched, with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) losing in all five seats in the four states.
Bihar bypoll
The opposition RJD in Bihar wrested the Bochahan assembly seat from the ruling NDA, with its candidate defeating the BJP nominee by a large margin of over 35,000 votes. RJD candidate Amar Paswan, whose father Musafir Paswan’s death had necessitated the by-election, polled 82,116 votes while his nearest BJP rival Baby Kumari got only 45,353. Expelled state minister Mukesh Sahani’s Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP), on the ticket of which Musafir Paswan had won the seat in 2020, finished a distant third with 29,671 votes. VIP was an NDA constituent till about a month ago.
West Bengal bypoll
The Trinamool Congress is on way to a clean sweep as it demolished rivals in the Asansol Lok Sabha seat where movie actor-turned politician Shatrughan Sinha is leading by an unassailable margin of nearly 2.8 lakh votes, while its candidate Babul Supriyo won the Ballygunge bypoll beating the nearest Left Front competitor Saira Shah Halim by 20038 votes.
Maharashtra bypoll
In a boost to the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) combine in Maharashtra, the Congress won the bypoll to the Kolhapur North Assembly constituency, retaining the seat by defeating the BJP by a margin of over 18,000 votes. Congress-MVA candidate Jayashri Jadhav bagged 96,176 votes, while BJP's Satyajeet Kadam polled 77,426 votes.
Jadhav emerged victorious by a margin of 18,750 votes. The by-election to this Assembly segment in Kolhapur district of western Maharashtra was necessitated following the death of sitting Congress MLA Chandrakant Jadhav due to COVID-19 in December 2021. The Congress had fielded the late legislator's widow from this seat.
The bypoll was held on April 12 in which 61.19 per cent voter turnout was recorded. Maharashtra BJP president Chandrakant Patil said his party accepts the decision given by the voters.
Chhattisgarh bypoll
The Congress candidate has been maintaining a significant lead by a margin of over 15,000 votes in the Khairagarh Assembly bypoll. After the 15th round of counting, Yashoda Verma of the Congress was leading by a margin of 15,633 votes against his nearest rival Komal Janghel of the BJP after three rounds of counting, he said. In the 2018 Assembly polls, the Congress registered a landslide victory winning 68 seats in the 90-member House decimating the BJP to 15. The JCC (J) and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) had bagged five and two seats respectively. Subsequently, the state witnessed bypolls to three Assembly seats, which were won by the Congress, improving its tally to 70 in the Assembly.
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