Mumbai, Nov 23 (PTI) BJP's Santukrao Hambarde is leading by 839 votes over his Congress rival Ravindra Chavan in the initial rounds of counting for the bypoll to the Nanded Lok Sabha seat in Maharashtra.

Hambarde is locked in a straight fight against the Congress candidate, who polled 86,771 votes against his 87,610.

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The bypoll to the Nanded Lok Sabha seat was necessitated due to the death of sitting Congress MP Vasant Chavan on August 26. Ravindra Chavan is his son.

Pratap Patil Chikhalikar, who won the 2019 Lok Sabha poll for the Nanded seat as a BJP candidate, had defeated Ashok Chavan then with the Congress. Chikhalikar lost the 2024 Lok Sabha poll from Nanded to Vasant Chavan by more than 59,000 votes.

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While Ashok Chavan joined the BJP in February this year, Chikhalikar is now with the Ajit Pawar-led NCP and is contesting the assembly poll from Loha in Nanded, which he has represented twice as an MLA.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)