Lalu, Nitish gain in Bihar bypolls, BJP trails

While RJD won Rajnagar, Chapra and Mohiuddinagar seats, Congress has won the Bhagalpur seat. In most of the other seats the alliance is ahead. BJP won the Narkatiaganj seat  in Bihar so far but going by trends is not doing well despite winning handsomely in the Lok Sabha polls this year.

The duo, both former chief ministers of Bihar, had joined hands to take on their common enemy Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the state. On Aug 11, they had held their first rally together and were seen hugging each other at the event. Both the parties entered into a seat-sharing agreement along with the Congress in which both JD-U and RJD had decided to contest in four seats each leaving two to the Congress in Bihar.

The BJP had won 32 of the 40 Lok Sabha seats in the state in this year’s Lok Sabha election. It is contesting the by-election in nine seats leaving only one to its ally Ramvilas Paswan’s Lok Janshakti Party (LJP).

The by-elections in Bihar are being seen as the semi-finals ahead of the high-voltage state Assembly polls scheduled next year.

In Punjab, former union minister and Congress leader Preneet Kaur won the Patiala assembly constituency, one of the state’s two seats where by-election was held last week. Earlier, the prestigious Patiala seat was held by Preneet Kaur's husband and Patiala royal Amarinder Singh who became a Congress MP defeating Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in Amritsar in 2014 general elections.

Preneet Kaur won the assembly by-election by a margin of over 23,000 votes, sources said. She had lost the Lok Sabha election from Patiala to Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party (AAP). This time, AAP candidate Harjeet Singh lost his deposit, having won only about 5,700 votes.

However, Jeet Mohinder Singh Sidhu of the ruling Akali Dal retained the Talwandi Sabo assembly seat where by-election took place after Sidhu quit the Congress switching allegiance to the Akali Dal. He defeated his nearest Congress rival Harminder Singh Jassi.

In Madhya Pradesh, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s Gopal Parmar won the Agar seat.

In Karnataka, NY Gopalakrishna of Congress won the Bellary Rural seat, a stronghold of BJP. Bellary was the constituency of BJP leader B Sriramulu.