Congress wins three seats, BJP one in Rajasthan

In a change of fortunes, the Congress Tuesday won three of the four assembly seats in Rajasthan where bypolls were held Sep 13. The ruling BJP won only one seat.

According to the declared results, Congress candidates won from Weir, Surajgarh and Nasirabad constituencies while the BJP's Sandeep Sharma was elected from the Kota South constituency.

Sharma defeated his nearest rival, Shivkant Nandwana of the Congress by over 25,000 votes.

The ruling party's candidate from Surajgarh, Digambar Singh, a close confidant of Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje, lost by a margin of over 3,000 votes to Shravan Kumar of the Congress.

Digambar Singh had also lost the 2013 assembly elections from Deeg-Kumher constituency in Bharatpur district.

Bypolls were held for all the four seats Sep 13.

The elections were necessitated as BJP legislators Sanwar Lal Jat from Nasirabad, Om Birla from Kota South, Santosh Ahlawat from Surajgarh, and Bahadur Singh Koli from Weir got elected to the Lok Sabha in the April-May general elections.

Over 65.25 percent of the 8.95 lakh electorate voted in these constituencies.

In all, 23 candidates were in the fray.

In the 2013 assembly elections, the Congress suffered one of its worst defeats in the history of the state, winning only 21 of the 200 assembly seats. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) swept the polls, winning 163 seats.

With these results, the BJP's tally is now down to 160 and the Congress party's strength has risen to 24.

The Congress workers were seen singing and dancing to the beat of drums as the party won on three seats.

"It is a win of our party workers. Despite the use of official machinery by the BJP, we have won. The BJP did nothing since it came to power and on the contrary it stopped the social welfare schemes, like free medicines and free medical diagonistic test that our party had launched," Sachin Pilot, state president of the Congress, told media persons.

Pilot said that party workers are enthusiastic and the party is now looking forward to the municipal and panchayat polls due in the next few months.

"This result does not in any reflect performance of the Raje government. It was fought more on local issues. Yes, the party will sit and introspect the results," said Kailash Nath Bhatt, state spokesperson of the BJP.