AAP's Mohinder Bhagat wins Jalandhar West seat; Congress distant third

Chandigarh: AAP's Mohinder Bhagat on Saturday won Jalandhar West assembly bypoll by defeating BJP's Sheetal Angural by margin of over 37,000 votes.

Congress nominee Surinder Kaur was distant third.

Celebrations broke out at the residence of Bhagat in Jalandhar as his family members and supporters were ecstatic over the lead.

Bhagat has been maintaining lead in counting of votes from the first round of counting.

SAD's Surjit Kaur was at the fourth spot while BSP nominee Binder Kumar was at fifth.

The bypoll was necessitated after the seat fell vacant following the resignation of Angural as the AAP legislator. He joined the BJP in March.

Polling in the seat took place on Wednesday and a voter turnout of 54.98 per cent was recorded, a sharp drop from the 67 per cent the assembly segment saw in the 2022 state elections.

The bypoll was being seen as a litmus test for the Punjab chief minister who would like his party to register victory to retain this reserved constituency.

The victory is important for Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann as his AAP faced a drubbing in the Lok Sabha polls in which it could win just three of the state's 13 parliamentary constituencies.