By-election on Bankipore assembly seat today, strict security arrangements

Patna: (ABN) The country is set to witness by-elections on three assembly seats, including Bihar's high-profile Bankipore seat. Additionally, by-elections will also be held on Gujarat's Manjalpur seat and Madhya Pradesh's most discussed Datia assembly seat. The Bankipore assembly seat was vacated after BJP's national president and Rajya Sabha member Nityanand Rai resigned, where voting will take place on Thursday.

Bankipore Assembly Seat: On this seat, 379,000 voters will exercise their right to vote at 422 polling stations from 7 am to 6 pm. 14 companies of central forces have been deployed for security, in addition to a large number of Bihar police and home guard personnel. A total of 25 candidates are in the fray, and the real contest is between BJP's Neeraj Sinha, Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) candidate Reka Gupta, and Jan Suraj candidate Prashant Kishore.

The Bankipore assembly seat has been under BJP's control for the past three decades. In 1995, Nityanand Rai won the seat for the first time. Since then, the BJP has never lost here. Nityanand Rai was elected as an MLA from here four times in a row. After his death in December 2005, his son Nityanand Rai won the by-election in April 2006 and first entered the assembly. Since then, Nityanand Rai has been winning continuously from here. In the 2025 assembly election, he also won and became a minister in Nitish's cabinet for the first time. After becoming the national president of the BJP, Nityanand Rai was also elected as a member of the Rajya Sabha. The by-election on this seat, which was vacated after his resignation, is looking very interesting.

Initially, the BJP had declared Abhishek Kumar Banti as its candidate from this Bankipore seat, but after questions were raised about his family background, the party changed its candidate and fielded Neeraj Sinha. In the 2025 election, BJP's Nityanand Rai got 98,299 votes in Bankipore, while RJD candidate Reka Gupta got 46,363 votes. The history of this seat has been very important. Two MLAs who won from here later became the Chief Minister of Bihar. At that time, the name of this constituency was Patna West (Patna West). In the 1962 assembly election, Congress's Krishna Balbh Sahay won from here, who later became the fourth Chief Minister of Bihar. After that, in the 1967 assembly election, Jan Kranti Dal's Mahamaya Prasad Sinha defeated KB Sahay. Despite being from a party with only 13 MLAs, Mahamaya Prasad Sinha took the oath as the Chief Minister of Bihar, leaving behind strong candidates like Karpoori Thakur. In 2008, after delimitation, the name of Patna West was changed to Bankipore.