Kolkata, Oct 6 (IANS): West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari on Tuesday said that the victory margin of Hasirani Rath, the BJP candidate in the bypoll in Nandigram Assembly Constituency, may surpass his own victory margin from the same constituency in 2016.
In 2016, he was elected from Nandigram as a Trinamool Congress candidate by a margin of over 80,000 votes.
“I got elected from here in 2016 by a margin of over 80,000. I believe that the winning margin of the BJP candidate in the Nandigram bypolls will surpass my own winning margin in 2016,” said CM Adhikari after casting his vote at a polling booth in Nandigram.
The Chief Minister came to the polling station riding a toto without his own convoy and security personnel and explained why he did that.
“As a Chief Minister, I am entitled to security. But today I came to the polling station as a voter of Nandigram. So, I chose to come like a common person. I also stood in the queue and cast my vote without taking any special advantage as the Chief Minister,” CM Adhikari said.
He also said polling in Nandigram had been going on peacefully, with voters casting their vote with the spirit of a festival of democracy.
“The polling percentage at Nandigram as of now is quite high, which generally does not happen in any bypoll,” the Chief Minister said.
He once again explained why he chose to retain Bhabanipur Assembly Constituency in South Kolkata instead of Nandigram. He won from both the constituencies in the assembly polls earlier this year.
“Had I not retained Bhabanipur, the person whom I defeated would have contested from Bhabanipur in a bypoll. I also defeated that person at Nandigram in 2021. But my emotional attachment with Nandigram will always be there,” the Chief Minister said.
He was indirectly referring to his predecessor and former West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who was defeated by him first at Nandigram in 2021 and then at Bhabanipur in 2026.
Speaking on the occasion, the Chief Minister also justified the arrest of the Aam Janata Unnayan Party (AJUP) founder-cum-legislator, Humayun Kabir, at Rejinagar in Murshidabad district earlier in the day.
“He is an elected legislator. But he is not a candidate for the Rejinagar bypoll. He is neither an election agent. So even as an elected legislator he could not move from booth to booth influencing the voters,” the Chief Minister said.
