Polling for Jalandhar West bye-elections 2024 has concluded and now the wait for results has begun. However, the bye-elections this year saw a significant decrease in the voter turnout as compared to the previous Jalandhar West Legislative Assembly elections. This year, the turnout was recorded at around 55% as compared to 2022 assembly elections’ 67.31%. The voter percentage reached 51.30% by 5 PM, 42.60% by 3 PM, 34.04% by 1 PM, 23.04% by 11 AM and 10.30% by 9 AM. Voting started at 7 AM and concluded at 6 PM.
In the 2022 assembly elections, the Jalandhar West assembly constituency recorded 67.31% voter turnout, while it reduced to 64.45% in the recent Lok Sabha elections. However, Congress led the polls in Jalandhar West while BJP, who were contesting the former MP Sushil Rinku were second in the runnings.
Talking about the candidates, they are the former senior deputy mayor Surinder Kaur for Congress, former BJP minister Chunni Lal Bhagat's son Mohinder Bhagat from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), and former MLA Sheetal Angural from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). With 39,213 (33.73%) votes, Sheetal Angural won the election in 2022 while representing AAP. Mohinder Bhagat, who was running for the BJP at the time, finished third with 36,649 (28.81%) votes, behind Sushil Rinku of the Congress. The SAD fielded Surjit Kaur as their candidate, who sparked controversy as she made two swift party shifts, joining AAP and then returning to SAD.
The seat was won by BJP in 2012, Congress in 2017 and AAP in 2022. AAP had won the seat by contesting with Sheetal Angural as their candidate, who switched party just before the Lok Sabha elections in March and resigned as the MLA. Mohinder Bhagat, who is now the AAP candidate was the BJP candidate in 2022.
A total of 1,71,963 voters are registered in the constituency and 181 polling booths have been set up.