Polling begins for Adampur bypoll

Polling began on Thursday for bypolls in Haryana's Adampur assembly constituency, whose outcome will decide if the Bhajan Lal family holds on to its bastion of five decades. Polling began at 7 am and will continue till 6 pm. Nearly 1.71 lakh voters are eligible to cast vote. Counting of votes will be taken up on November 6.

Twenty-two candidates, all men, are in the fray. The main parties contesting are the BJP, Congress, Indian National Lok Dal, and the Aam Aadmi Party.

Read | Assembly bypolls: Voting begins in seven constituencies in six states

The bypoll was necessitated after former Haryana Chief Minister Bhajan Lal's younger son Kuldeep Bishnoi resigned as MLA from the seat and switched sides from the Congress to the BJP in August. Bishnoi's son Bhavya, who is contesting the bypoll as the BJP candidate, had also quit the Congress and joined the BJP.

Bhavya, 29, had lost 2019 Lok Sabha polls from Hisar to BJP's bureaucrat-turned-politician Brijendra Singh. The Congress has fielded former Union minister Jai Prakash, a three-time MP from Hisar and two-time MLA as well.

The INLD picked Congress rebel Kurda Ram Nambardar as its candidate. The AAP has fielded Satender Singh, who switched over from the BJP.

Kuldeep Bishnoi defeated the late Sonali Phogat, who had contested on a BJP ticket, in Adampur in the 2019 assembly elections.

Kuldeep Bishnoi along with his mother Jasma Devi, son Bhavya, and wife Renuka, were among the voters who turned up early at the polling booth and cast vote.

"Everyone should come and cast their vote," Kuldeep Bishnoi said after casting his vote.

A total of 180 polling booths have been set up, 36 of them have been termed "sensitive" and 39 "hypersensitive."

Tight security arrangements have been made by the district administration to conduct the polling in a free, fair, and peaceful manner, officials said.

Kuldeep Bishnoi has maintained that Adampur has been his family's citadel and that people have showered their love and blessings on it for decades and would do so once again. The Adampur seat has been held by the Bhajan Lal family since 1968, with the late ex-chief minister representing it on nine occasions, his wife Jasma Devi once, and Kuldeep on four occasions.

Congress leader and former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, however, has termed Adampur a stronghold of his party. Late Bhajan Lal was a chief minister from the Congress, he had added.