Chhindwara, Madhya Pradesh – Around 79 percent voter turnout was recorded at the Amarwara State Assembly seat in Chhindwara district during the bypoll conducted yesterday.
Officials noted late Wednesday that the final voting percentage might see a slight adjustment as all polling data is compiled. The turnout for the bypoll was nearly 10 percent lower than the 88.63 percent recorded during the 2023 Assembly elections at Amarwara.
Nine candidates contested the bypoll, with the main competition between Congress candidate Dheeran Shah Invati and BJP’s Kamlesh Shah. Kamlesh Shah, a three-time Congress MLA and close confidant of former Congress chief minister Kamal Nath, had switched to the BJP, prompting the bypoll. He had won the seat in the 2023 Assembly polls on a Congress ticket but resigned from the party and his MLA position on March 29, ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
In the 2023 assembly polls, Kamlesh Shah defeated BJP’s Monika Manmohan Shah Batti by a margin of 25,086 votes. Historically, the BJP has won the Amarwara seat only twice, in 1990 and 2008, while the Congress has secured victory nine times. The tribal outfit Gondwana Gantantra Party (GGP) won the seat in 2003 and fielded Devraven Bhalavi for the current bypoll.
The counting of votes will take place on July 13.
