Except in Bihar, ruling parties win by-elections

Ruling parties in West Bengal, Maharashtra and Chhattisgarh won while in Bihar, the ruling NDA alliance lost the seat to the opposition RJD, as results of one Lok Sabha seat and four assembly seats across four states came out on Saturday.

Trinamool Congress, for the first time in its history, won the Asansol Lok Sabha seat where its candidate film star Shatrughan Sinha beat BJP's Agnimitra Paul with a record margin of 300,383 votes.

The seat had gone vacant after BJP MP Babul Supriyo resigned from the party and joined Trinamool Congress.


Supriyo contested the Ballygunge assembly seat on Trinamool ticket and won by 20,228 votes over the CPI(M) candidate Saira Shah Halim. BJP's Keya Ghosh finished third.

"This is the first time we have won the Asansol seat since the inception of our party. We have won with a record vote. I thank the people of Asansol for voting for us," West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee said. "I would urge the people of Bengal and my political colleagues to maintain peace and harmony. Despite BJP's conspiracy, people are reposing faith in us."

BJP had won the Asansol seat in 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Before that, CPI(M) used to win there.

In Maharashtra, Congress retained its Kolhapur North seat despite BJP's strong Hindutva campaign in the constituency. The by-poll was necessitated after the untimely death of Congress MLA Chandrakant Jadhav due to Covid-19 in December 2021. Congress fielded his wife Jayshree Jadhav as the ruling Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) alliance candidate. She defeated BJP's Satyajeet Kadam by a margin of 18,800 votes.

In Chhattisgarh, Congress won the Khairagarh seat defeating two-time MLA and BJP candidate Komal Janghel by 20,176 votes. In 2018, the seat was won by Devwrat Singh of Janta Congress Chhattisgarh of Ajit Jogi.

In Bihar, the ruling NDA alliance lost the Bochahan seat to RJD. The seat felt vacant after the death of sitting MLA Musafir Paswan who represented Vikassheel Insaan Party (VIP), then a part of the ruling alliance. This time BJP fielded its own candidate Baby Kumari while ousting VIP from NDA. RJD fielded Amar Paswan, Musafir Paswan's son. Paswan won this seat by 36,653 votes.