New Delhi, October 15: The by-polls for 48 assembly constituencies and two Lok Sabha seats will be held in two phases along with the assembly elections in Maharashtra and Jharkhand, the Election Commission said on Tuesday.
The by-polls for as many as 47 assembly seats and one Lok Sabha seat will be held on November 13, along with the first phase of Jharkhand assembly polls. The remaining 1 assembly seat and one parliamentary seat will be voted on November 20, along with Maharashtra polls, the poll panel said.
The counting of votes will be done on November 23, along with Maharashtra and Jharkhand, the ECI said.
The Lok Sabha seat going for by-polls on November 13 is Wayanad, vacated by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi after he won it in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. Rahul Gandhi, instead retained Rae Bareli which he also worked in the 2024 general elections.
The Congress party will field Priyanka Gandhi, Rahul's sister, from the Wayanad seat. Rahul won this seat in Kerala in 2019 too.
The 47 assembly seats voting during by-polls on November 13 include ten in Uttar Pradesh. These are Katehari (Ambedkar Nagar), Karhal (Mainpuri), Milkipur (Ayodhya), Meerapur (Muzaffarnagar), Ghaziabad, Majhawan (Mirzapur), Sishamau (Kanpur city), Khair (Aligarh), Phulpur (Prayagraj) and Kundarki (Moradabad).
Nine of these seats fell vacant after the MLAs were elected as MPs in the Lok Sabha polls in 2024. The bypoll on the tenth seat, Sishamau was mandated after the disqualification of SP MLA Irfan Solanki.
The by-poll for 10 UP seats is a test for the opposition after its performance in the Lok Sabha polls 2024 in the state and for the ruling BJP ahead of the 2027
The SP won 37 seats, while its INDIA bloc partner, Congress managed to secure six Lok Sabha seats, providing a morale boost for a party that had been sidelined in the state for years.
In the 2022 UP assembly elections, the SP won six of these ten seats namely Sisamau, Katehari, Karhal, Milkipur, and Kundarki. The BJP won in three -- Phulpur, Ghaziabad, and Khair, with the Nishad Party winning in Majhawan. The Meerapur seat was held by the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), a former ally of the SP, now with the BJP.