BJP-led alliance to win all five seats in Assam bypolls: Sarbananda Sonowal

Guwahati, Oct 28 (IANS) Union Minister Sarbananda Sonowal on Monday asserted that the BJP and its allies are set to win all five seats in Assam which are going to bypolls in the next month.

Sonowal said, “The double engine government has done tremendous development in the state after the BJP came to power here. The general public witnessed the development initiatives of the ruling dispensation over the last few years and the landscape of Assam has changed due to this development politics.”

He claimed that the Congress several times failed to bring change in people’s lives when they were in power and the voters have understood this fact.

“People have seen that only the BJP is able to do large-scale development in an area. Moreover, voters are very happy with the performance of Himanta Biswa Sarma-led government here. I am hopeful that we will win all five seats where by-elections will take place in a few days,” Sonowal said, adding that Congress and other opposition parties cannot convince voters to vote for them instead of the BJP.

Bypolls to five Assembly constituencies in Assam will be held on November 13 and votes will be counted on November 23.

The by-elections were necessitated as these seats fell vacant following the election of the incumbent MLAs to the Lok Sabha.

Out of these five Assembly seats, four were earlier held by the BJP and its allies. Congress had only one seat—Samaguri which is a bastion of former Assam minister Rakibul Hussain.

Hussain has been representing the Samaguri in the State Assembly since 2001. He has not lost a single election in the last 23 years.

The senior Congress leader challenged AIUDF chief Badruddin Ajmal in the Dhubri Lok Sabha seat in the parliamentary elections. This seat was held by Ajmal since 2009. Hussain won by a margin of more than 10 lakh votes putting a stop to Ajmal’s hold in that seat.

Now Hussain’s son Tanjil Hussain has been fielded by the Congress from the Samaguri Assembly constituency in the upcoming bypoll.

However, the BJP has been eyeing to oust Congress from Samaguri. The ruling party, this time, has thrown its top leaders into the campaign for the by-elections.

--IANS

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