BJP wins 3 of 5 bypolls, Trinamool 1

Lucknow/Kolkata, Dec 24

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In a blow to the ruling AIADMK in Tamil Nadu, rival faction candidate TTV Dhinakaran today won the RK Nagar Assembly bypoll, bettering J Jayalalithaa's margin, while the BJP wrested two seats from the Congress in Arunachal Pradesh and retained one in UP.

The Trinamool Congress (TMC), in power in West Bengal, unseated the Congress in Sabang Assembly constituency defeating its nearest rival, the CPM, by over 64,000 votes.

In Uttar Pradesh, the BJP retained the Sikandra Assembly seat in a bypoll in Kanpur Dehat district, a place which gained notoriety after the 1981 Behmai massacre of 21 upper caste Rajputs allegedly by a gang led by bandit Phoolan Devi.

Polling for the five seats was held on December 21.

In Arunachal, where the BJP is in power, the party wrested the Pakke-Kessang and Likabali Assembly seats from the Congress. PM Narendra Modi hailed BJP victories in UP and Arunachal and said his party was committed to serving the country's villages.

He also expressed happiness over the party's improved performance in the West Bengal by-election.

BJP chief Amit Shah cited his party's win in the bypolls to claim that its good governance agenda has prevailed over the Opposition's "anti-development" politics. With the Congress not winning any of the five seats in the bypolls, Shah took a dig at it, saying that he hoped the party will not claim a moral victory.

The 60-member Arunachal Assembly now has 49 MLAs from the saffron party, nine from the Peoples' Party of Arunachal (PPA), one from Congress and one Independent.

BR Waghe of the BJP won the Pakke-Kessang seat by 475 votes, defeating his lone rival and former deputy CM Kameng Dolo of the Congress, Chief Electoral Officer DJ Bhattacharjee said.

In the Likabali, BJP's Kardo Nyigyor won by just 305 votes, defeating his nearest rival, Gumke Riba of the PPA in a multi-cornered contest. The Likabali seat had fallen vacant after state minister Jomde Kena passed away on September 4. The bypoll in Pakke- Kessang was held after the Gauhati High Court declared the election of Dolo from the constituency polls null and void.

In West Bengal's Sabang seat, while TMC candidate Gita Rani Bhunia secured 1,06,179 votes, her closest rival, Rita Mandal of the CPM, bagged 41,987 votes.

Antara Bhattacharya of the BJP polled 37,476 votes and the Congress' Chiranjib Bhowmick got 18,060, West Midnapore District Magistrate Jagdish Prasad Meena said.

The bypoll came in the wake of former Congress MLA Manas Bhunia defecting to the TMC earlier this year. He is a Rajya Sabha member.

The biggest jolt was to the Congress, which not only lost one of its citadels to the TMC, but also finished a distant fourth in the bypoll. Sabang had been a Congress stronghold since 1957.

The results came as a booster for the TMC and the Mamata Banerjee-led West Bengal government, ahead of the panchayat polls and two by-elections in Noapara Assembly constituency and Uluberia Lok Sabha seat due early next year.

According to the Uttar Pradesh chief electoral officer's office, BJP's Ajit Singh Pal secured 73,284 votes while his nearest rival, Seema Sachan of the Samajwadi Party, bagged 61,423. Prabhakar Pandey of the Congress secured 19,084 votes. The Sikandra bypoll was held following the death of sitting BJP MLA, Mathura Prasad Pal, on July 22. — TNS & PTI