After the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led alliance in Assam on Tuesday won all the five Assembly seats where bypolls were held, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said the people of North East have reposed their faith in the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
"We won all 5 seats with a huge margin. Today's electoral victory in Assam isn't an ordinary victory as in every seat we won by a margin higher than in general elections. People of North East have reposed their faith in leadership of PM Modi," Himanta Biswa Sarma said.
"Bharatiya Janata Party is now a national party. It is no longer confined to 5-6 states. It is capable to win elections from any state," he added.
The BJP bagged three seats and its ally United Peoples' Party Liberal (UPPL) won two seats.
BJP's Phani Talukdar, Rupjyoti Kurmi and Sushanta Borgohain retained their respective Bhabanipur, Mariani and Thowra seats which they had won in the assembly elections held earlier this year on tickets given by other parties but resigned after joining the saffron party.
Kurmi retained the Mariani assembly constituency for the sixth time defeating Congress candidate Luhit Konwar by 40,104 votes while Talukdar won the Bhabanipur seat for the second time beating Sailendra Das of the grand old party by 25,641 votes.
Borgohain also retained the Thowra constituency winning by a margin of 30,561 votes over Raijor Dal's Dhaijya Konwar, who fought as an independent candidate.
BJP's ally UPPL wrested the Gossaigaon constituency with its candidate Jiron Basumatary defeating Congress nominee Jowel Tudu by a margin of 28,252 votes while another party candidate Jolen Daimary beat his nearest rival, independent candidate Ganesh Kachary, by 57,059 votes in the Tamulpur seat.
The bypolls to these two constituencies were necessitated following the deaths of BPF and UPPL MLAs in Gossaigaon and Tamulpur respectively.
With these results, the BJP's strength in the 126-member Assam assembly increased to 62 and UPPL's to eight. The other partner in the ruling coalition, Asom Gana Parishad, which had not fielded any candidate in this bypoll, has nine MLAs.
On the opposition bench, the Congress' strength is 27, AIUDF has 15 members, BPF three, the CPI(M) one and there is an Independent MLA as well.
(With PTI inputs)
