In a closely fought contest, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) managed to retain its hold on the Bageshwar Assembly seat in Uttarakhand in the bypoll conducted on September 5. The victorious candidate, Parwati Dass, won by a slim margin of 2,405 votes, navigating a field that saw intense competition and alliances tested.
Parwati Dass stepped into the political arena following the demise of her husband, Chandan Ram Dass, a seasoned politician who had triumphed in Bageshwar four times and held significant portfolios including Social Welfare and Road Transport. His passing in April set the stage for this by-election. The BJP’s choice to field his widow was seen as a strategy to secure sympathy votes, a move that ultimately proved successful despite the narrow victory margin.
The Congress party faced its own set of hurdles, beginning with the defection of their 2022 candidate, Ranjit Das, to the BJP weeks before the polling day. Although not chosen as the BJP’s representative, the departure marked a significant loss for the Congress. The party, in response, chose to field a former AAP candidate named Kumar to contest the vital seat.
Adding to the Congress’s challenges was the decision of their ally, the Samajwadi Party (SP), to enter a candidate into the race. Despite a meagre show in the 2022 Assembly elections with just 0.68% vote share in the Bageshwar seat, the SP remained undeterred. Their choice, Bhagawati Prasad, however, managed to secure only 637 votes in the bypoll, further illuminating their limited influence in the region.
The historical backdrop to this election has the BJP holding its ground in Bageshwar, a Scheduled Caste reserved seat in the Kumaon region, since 2007, with the Congress last tasting victory in 2002. The recent election saw a voter turnout of 55.44%, with the populace casting their votes across 188 polling booths.
Notably, the BJP carried forward its legacy in a constituency that harbours around 1.2 lakh voters, despite a fiercely competitive atmosphere and the shifting sands of political alliances. The bypoll results echo the 2022 Assembly outcomes where BJP garnered 43.14% of the votes, significantly leading over Congress’s 26.88%.
While the by-election victory is a feather in BJP’s cap, the narrow margin underscores a dynamically evolving political landscape, setting a premise of unpredictable and potentially closely fought battles in future electoral contests. The discerning electorate of Bageshwar has signalled that every vote counts, a narrative that may carry deep into the forthcoming political endeavours.
