Summary:
Jaipur, Dec 8 (PTI) The Congress is leading in the Sardarshahar assembly seat in Rajasthan"s Churu district, according to trends available for the bypoll on Thursday morning.
In the initial round, the Congress has got 6,853 votes followed by the BJP with 3,862 votes, and Rashtriya Loktantrik Party of Nagaur MP Hamuman Beniwal with 3,007 votes, according to the Election Commission.
The counting commenced at 8 am, the official said.
The constituency recorded a voting percentage of 72.09 per cent on polling day on Monday.
A total of 2,89,843 voters were eligible to exercise their franchise in the bypoll necessitated by the demise of Congress MLA Bhanwar Lal Sharma, who passed away on October 9 after prolonged illness.
Polling was held amid tight security arrangements across all 295 booths in the assembly segment.
The Congress fielded Sharma"s son Anil Kumar while former MLA Ashok Kumar is the BJP candidate.
Eight other candidates are in the fray: Lalchand of the Rashtriya Loktantrik Party (RLP), Sanwarmal Meghwal of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), Parmana Ram of the Indian People"s Green Party, and Independent candidates Subhash Chandra, Vijay Pal Singh Sheoran, Umesh Sahu, Prem Singh, and Surendra Singh Rajpurohit.
In the 200-member Rajasthan Assembly, the Congress currently has 107 MLAs, BJP 71, RLP three, CPI(M) and Bhartiya Tribal Party two each, Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) one, and 13 are Independents.
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