Voting begins for bypolls to six Assembly seats in Gujarat

The by-elections are being held in Tharad, Radhanpur, Kheralu, Bayad, Amraiwadi and Lunawada seats, where voting began at 8 am and will end at 6 pm, a poll official said.

A total of 42 candidates are in the fray for the bypolls, which are being viewed as a battle of prestige for Chief Minister Vijay Rupani, as four of these six seats were held by the ruling BJP.

Byelections were necessitated in Radhanpur and Bayad due to the resignations of sitting MLAs Alpesh Thakor and Dhavalsinh Zala, who quit the Congress and joined the BJP.

The ruling party has fielded both of them from their respective seats in the by-election.

Besides, bypolls became necessary in Tharad, Lunawada, Kheralu and Amraiwadi after the BJP MLAs of these seats got elected to the Lok Sabha.

The BJP has fielded Jivrajbhai Patel in Tharad, Jignesh Sevak in Lunawada, Ajmalbhai Thakor in Kheralu and Jagdish Patel in Amraiwadi.

The Congress has nominated Gulabsinh Rajput from Tharad, Raghubhai Desai from Radhanpur, Babuji Thakor from Kheralu, Jasubhai Patel from Bayad, Dharmendra Patel from Amraiwadi and Gulabsinh Chauhan from Lunawada.

In the Lok Sabha elections held earlier this year, the BJP bagged all 26 parliamentary seats in Gujarat.