The bypolls were held in six constituencies - Naihati, Haroa, Medinipur, Taldangra, Sitai (SC), and Madarihat (ST) - following the resignation of MLAs who had vacated their assembly seats after securing victories in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
As per the latest data available on the Election Commission's website, the BJP got 38.09 per cent votes while TMC which swept the assembly elections polled 47.97 per cent votes.
One hundred and thirty-three candidates will try their luck from the constituencies falling under the districts of West Midnapore, Purulia and Bankura.
As many as 725 companies of the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) will be deployed in West Bengal for the conduct of forthcoming assembly elections, CRPF chief Kuldiep Singh said on Thursday.
'With sufficient gaps between polling dates, the BJP will have time to convert the 'fence-sitter' votes,' observes Payal Mohanka.
BJP president J P Nadda drew a parallel between the post-poll result violence in West Bengal with the bloodshed during India's Partition, while his colleagues compared the Trinamool Congress with Nazis, as the saffron party's leaders protested in different cities on Tuesday against attacks targeting its workers in the state.
The BJP announced its list of 148 candidates for the last four phases of assembly election in West Bengal, rewarding around 20 turncoats and fielding party heavyweights Mukul Roy and Rahul Sinha.
Bypolls will be held on Wednesday in 31 assembly seats spread across 10 states and Kerala's Wayanad Lok Sabha constituency, from where Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is making her electoral debut. Though these bye-elections are not going to have any bearing on the governments, they are seen as a big test for the Congress and the INDIA bloc which failed to put up a united show in the recent Haryana assembly polls. Most of these seats fell vacant after the sitting MLAs contested the Lok Sabha elections and won while in some constituencies, the bypolls are being held due to death of the representatives. The Wayanad seat was vacated by Rahul Gandhi, who also won from the Rae Bareli parliamentary constituency which he kept. Voting will be held in seven seats in Rajasthan, six in West Bengal, five in Assam, four seats in Bihar, three in Karnataka, two seats in Madhya Pradesh, and one seat each in Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Kerala and Meghalaya. Votes will be counted on November 23.
Vijayvargiya, who is also the BJP's Bengal minder, also said that he has received a call from Union Home Minister Amit Shah, who enquired about the party's poor show.
The top leaders of the Communist Party of India-Marxist met in New Delhi on Monday to study its debacle in the assembly elections. Here's what they analysed.
Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday challenged Home Minister Amit Shah to debate with him on his three press conferences in which the Congress leader alleged 'vote chori' by the Bharatiya Janata Party in collusion with the Election Commission.
A Bharatiya Janata Party leader, who the Trinamool Congress said is a brother-in-law of the saffron party's national vice-president Mukul Roy, rejoined the ruling party of West Bengal on Wednesday.
The constitution of a committee by the Centre to explore the feasibility of "one nation, one election" has opened up the possibility of Lok Sabha polls being advanced so that they could be held with a string of state assembly polls.
The officers have been deployed for north, west and south zones of the state as well as for the Kolkata Police areas.
The top court said if it transfers the election petition, it would be an expression of lack of faith in the entire high court.
Sporadic post-poll violence continued on Tuesday in West Bengal claiming several lives as chief minister Mamata Banerjee asked officials to act decisively and Prime Minister Narendra Modi rang up Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar to express anguish over the law-and-order situation.
On Monday, the TMC leader had alleged that the returning officer of Nandigram did not order recounting of votes even after she demanded it as he feared for his life.
Taking a serious view of violence after the assembly poll results in West Bengal, the Calcutta high court on Friday ordered the state home secretary to file a report mentioning the places where the post-poll violence occurred and the steps taken to contain the violence.
The BJP, which has emerged as the main opposition party in West Bengal after winning 77 seats in the assembly polls last year, failed to win even a single civic body.
Nitin Nabin has been formally declared as the BJP national president, succeeding J P Nadda. The leadership transition was witnessed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other senior ministers.
The CMs with lowest assets are West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee with assets worth over Rs 15.38 lakh, Omar Abdullah, CM of Jammu and Kashmir, with assets worth over Rs 55.24 lakh, and Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan, who has assets worth Rs 1.18 crore.
Uttam Ghosh wonders if the farmers's concerns will be addressed now that the BJP has embarked on Mission Bengal.
The Congress 'Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra', led by Rahul Gandhi, is scheduled to enter West Bengal from Assam on Thursday, amid political ripples within the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) in the state.
Election Commission officials report finding a large number of illegal migrants from Nepal, Bangladesh, and Myanmar during a review of Bihar's voters' list. Measures are being taken to exclude them from the final electoral roll.
