Bypolls result 2023: Setback for TMC as Congress wins Sagardighi; BJP backed candidate set to win Jharkhand's Ramgarh

The by-elections to both Ramgarh and Sagardighi assembly constituencies took place on February 27. In both seats, votes polled ranged between 60 to 70 percent.

Hyderabad: Congress candidate Bayron Biswas won from Sagardighi assembly seat in West Bengal's Murshidabad district as he defeated TMC's Debashish Banerjee by a margin of over 22,000 votes as the counting in bye-elections was about to complete.

Biswas at the end of 15 of 16 rounds of counting had bagged 85437 votes against Banerjee's got 63,003 votes. Dilip Saha of the BJP secured 25,506 votes. Biswas winning the by-election is a major win for the party and a prestige point for Congress president Adhir Chowdhury in his home district. It is the party's first seat in this assembly, which has a strength of 294.

Earlier in the day, Biswas said he was confident of his victory. "The people here are fed up with the corruption and misrule of the TMC," he said. The by-poll was necessitated due to the death of state minister Subrata Saha in December last year. The TMC has been winning the seat since 2011 and secured a margin of more than 50,000 votes in the 2021 assembly elections.

Meanwhile, in Jharkhand's Ramgarh, All Jharkhand Students’ Union (AJSU) party candidate Sunita Choudhary who was backed by the BJP is leading by a margin of over 20,000 votes. Her win will be a setback for the ruling JMM-Congress coalition in the state. It will be the alliance’s first defeat in a bypoll in years. Rampur by-election was necessitated after the disqualification of Congress MLA Mamta Devi. Devi was convicted in a criminal case. The Congress fielded Mamta Devi’s husband Bajrang Mahto.