'Victory of INDIA bloc': Opposition bags 4 bypoll seats as BJP settles for 3. Top points

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alliance as they face off against the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance(NDA), saw the former win 4 seats in total, as opposed to the saffron party winning three. The bypolls were the first electoral test for the INDIA alliance of 28 parties formed recently to take on the BJP in the Lok Sabha polls next year.

Of the seven seats where bypolls were held on September 5, three were earlier held by the BJP, and one each was with the Congress, SP, CPI(M) and JMM. Trinamool Congress (TMC) won Dhupguri seat usurping BJP, Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) retained their Dumri seat, Chandy Oommen of Congress marked a historic win in Kerala's Puthupally, and Samajwadi Party (SP) won the Ghosi seat in Uttar Pradesh, giving INDIA the edge of winning 4 seats in 7 bypolls.

Meanwhile, BJP won seats in Tripura's Boxanagar, Dhanpur, and Uttarakhand's Bageswar. Ahead of the crucial 2024 Lok Sabha polls, the Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Telangana, and Mizoram Assembly elections are being considered as litmus test for the INDIA and NDA bloc.

The bypolls also hold significance as BJP-led NDA eyes a return to power in the 2024 Lok Sabha Elections, for a third straight term, while INDIA in their ‘Mission 2024’ aims to thwart this attempt of the Narendra Modi led government. Here are the top points Dealing a crushing blow to Kerala's ruling LDF, Congress candidate Chandy Oommen retained for the party-led UDF, the Puthuppally assembly seat, which his father and former Chief Minister Oommen Chandy held for over half-a-century.

Chandy Oommen trounced his main rival Jaick C Thomas of CPI(M) by a huge and historic margin in the bypoll. The 37-year-old Oommen defeated Thomas by a margin of 37,719 votes in the bypoll