Team News Riveting
New Delhi, June 23
The Aam Adami Party (AAP) bagged two of the five assembly constituencies that went to the mid-term polls on June 19.
The BJP could secure one and so were the Left and Trinamool.
In Kerala, the Pinarayi Vijayan-led LDF government received a jolt as the opposition Congress-led UDF wrested the Nilambur Assembly constituency from it by a margin of 11,077 votes. Congress’ Aryadan Shoukath, the son of the late Congress stalwart Aryadan Muhammed, defeated CPI(M) state secretariat member M Swaraj in the fiercely fought byelection.
It is the fourth byelection defeat for the Marxist party-led Left Democratic Front during the ongoing second term of the Pinarayi Vijayan government in Kerala. Earlier, the LDF earlier lost in Puthuppally, Palakkad and Thrikkakara Assembly segments. While the BJP secured the fourth position, the victory for the Congress-led UDF would provide a much-needed boost ahead of the Assembly polls next year.
In West Bengal, the ruling Trinamool Congress candidate Alifa Ahmed won from the Kaliganj Assembly seat by a landslide margin of 50,049 votes over her nearest BJP rival Ashish Ghosh, bettering the 2021 winning margin of her father Nasiruddin Ahmed, whose demise in February this year necessitated the byelection.
In Gujarat, Italia, the former president of the Gujarat unit of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), defeated his nearest BJP rival Kirit Patel in Visavadar seat of Junagadh district by a margin of 17,554 votes. Despite its near-total dominance in the state, the BJP has not won the Visavadar seat since 2007. The seat fell vacant in December 2023 after the then AAP legislator Bhupendra Bhayani resigned and joined the ruling BJP.
The ruling party however could get breather in Kadi assembly constituency as its candidate Rajendra Chavda bagged the seat of Mehsana district in Gujarat, reserved for the Scheduled Caste candidates, by a margin of 39,452 votes over Congress’ Ramesh Chavda. The by-election in Kadi seat was necessitated following the death of BJP MLA Karsan Solanki.
Punjab’s ruling AAP retained the Ludhiana West Assembly seat with its candidate Sanjeev Arora defeating his nearest rival and Congress candidate Bharat Bhushan Ashu by a margin of 10,637 votes.
Arora secured 35,179 votes while Ashu got 24,542 votes, according to the Election Commission data. BJP’s Jiwan Gupta polled 20,323 votes while the Shiromani Akali Dal’s nominee Parupkar Singh Ghuman got 8,203 votes.
The byelection was necessitated following the death of AAP MLA Gurpreet Bassi Gogi in January.
