Kolkata: The ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC) on Thursday swept the bypolls to the Assembly constituencies of Kaliaganj, Kharagpur and Karimpur. Out of the three, the Karimpur seat was held by Trinamool MLA Mahua Moitra, who resigned after being elected to the Lok Sabha.
In Kaliaganj, Trinamool candidate Tapan Deb Singha won by a margin of 2,304 votes. In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, BJP had a lead of over 56,000 votes in this assembly segment.
In Kharagpur Sadar, the seat vacated by the BJP State President, Trinamool has won by a margin of 18,747 votes. The BJP had a lead of nearly 45,000 votes in this seat during Lok Sabha elections.
In Karimpur, Trinamool has taken a healthy lead of over 25,000 votes in the initial rounds of counting.Chief Minister and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee has termed this win as a victory
of the people. She said, people have rejected the arrogance of BJP.
BJP retains Pithoragarh Assembly seat
The Bharatiya Janata Party emerged victorious in Pithoragarh Assembly seat of Uttarakhand where counting got underway on Thursday morning. Counting of the votes began with 556 postal ballots using Electronically Transmitted Postal Ballot System (ETPBS) which was followed by Electronic Voting Machines.The saffron party candidate won against its rival Congress by more than 3000 votes .
Bypoll to the seat was necessitated following the demise of BJP leader and former Cabinet Minister Prakash Pant. The main contenders for the seat are BJP and Congress.
While the BJP had fielded Pant's wife Chandra Pant, Anju Lunthi was the Congress candidate for the bypolls.A total of 47 per cent of the 1,05,711 electorate cast their votes in 145 polling booths on Monday.(UNI)