The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has registered a decisive victory in the Nandigram Assembly bypoll in West Bengal, with party candidate Hasi Rani Rath defeating her nearest rival, Milan Pradhan of the Indian National Congress, by a margin of 1,22,753 votes.
Rath secured 1,64,427 votes, including 1,63,630 votes from the EVM count and 797 postal votes, accounting for 75.94 per cent of the total votes polled, according to the ECI. Pradhan finished second with 41,674 votes, comprising 41,521 EVM votes and 153 postal votes. He secured 19.25 per cent of the total votes polled.
Adhikari had won both constituencies. The by-election was necessitated after West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari vacated Nandigram to retain Bhabanipur, where he defeated former chief minister Mamata Banerjee in the 2026 Assembly elections. The contest was closely watched as an early electoral test for the BJP government, which ended the Trinamool Congress’s 15-year rule in West Bengal earlier this year.
