KOLKATA: As counting for the bypolls on the Asansol Lok Sabha seat and the Ballygunge Assembly constituency proceeds in West Bengal, the Trinamool Congress, the state's ruling party, appears to be on track to win both seats.
If the current trend continues, the Trinamool Congress will win the Asansol seat for the first time. Till mid-noon Saturday, Babul Supriyo, the Trinamool Congress candidate for Asansol, was leading his nearest rival, CPI(MSaira )'s Shah Halim, by 10,851 votes. However, the BJP's Ballygunge candidate, Keya Ghosh, who had been in fourth place after three rounds of counting until 10.30 a.m., improved her position after the 14th round and climbed to third place, leaving the Congress's Kamruzzamn Chowdhury in fourth place.
At the same time, Shatrughan Sinha of the Trinamool Congress was leading BJP's Agnimitra Paul by over 1.35 lakh votes in Asansol. Partha Mukherjee of the CPI(M) and Prasenjit Patitundi of the Congress were third and fourth, respectively.
Former Union Minister Babul Supriyo resigned as the Lok Sabha MP after quitting from the BJP and joining the Trinamool Congress after the 2021 West Bengal Assembly elections, necessitating the by-poll. Supriyo, a BJP candidate, defeated Trinamool rival Moon Sen, an actress-turned-politician, by a significant margin of 1,97,637 votes and received 51.56 percent of the total votes cast.
Following the death of former state minister Subrata Mukherjee, a by-election for the Ballygunge Assembly seat was called. In the 2021 West Bengal Assembly elections, the Trinamool leader trounced his nearest rival, BJP's Loknath Chatterjee, by a large majority of 75,359 votes.
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