Jalandhar Lok Sabha bypolls: AAP maintains huge lead

As per the early trends by the Election Commission of India (ECI), the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is leading in the Jalandhar Lok Sabha seat, which went to by-polls on May 10 and the counting for which began at 8 a.m. on Saturday.

AAP’s Sushil Rinku is now leading by more than 23000 votes over its nearest rival, Congress’ Karamjit Kaur Chaudhary. A tight security arrangement has been put in place in and around the counting centres set up at the office of the Director of Land Records and Sports College Complex in Kapurthala Road.

The Jalandhar by-polls were held on May 10 and recorded a voter turnout of 54.70 percent, well below the 63.04 percent recorded in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.

The byelection for Jalandhar Lok Sabha, one of the 13 Lok Sabha constituencies in Punjab, was necessitated after sitting MP Santokh Singh Chaudhary of the Congress passed away on 14 January this year following a cardiac arrest during the party’s Bharat Jodo Yatra.

As per the officials, all EVMs and VVPAT machines were kept in the ‘strong room’ after the voting and three-layer security had been installed.

In the elections, Congress has fielded Chaudhary’s widow, Karamjit Kaur Chaudhary, from Jalandhar, while the BJP has fielded Inder Iqbal Singh Atwal, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has fielded Sushil Kumar Rinku, the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) has given a ticket to Dr. Sukhwinder Kumar Sukhi, and the Shiromani Akali Dal (Amritsar) or SAD (A) has placed its hopes on Gurjant Singh Kattu to wrest this seat.