New Delhi, December 19: By-Elections will be held today, on Thursday, to fill vacancy in the state legislative assembly of Gujarat and Jharkhand. In Gujarat, the by-election is on Jasdan assembly seat and in Jharkhand, the election is on Kolebira assembly seat. The date of counting for the bye-elections is December 23, 2018.

Talking about the Jasdan assembly seat, the bye-election here will be a prestige battle for the BJP and Congress. Jasdan is considered a Congress bastion. The Jasdan bypoll was necessitated after Kunwarji Bawaliya joined the BJP after resigning from both the legislature and the Congress party. He was made a cabinet minister in the Vijay Rupani-led BJP government in July.

About Kolebira assembly seat, five candidates are in the fray for the seat. Menon Akka of the Jharkhand Party, BJP's Basant Soreng, Congress' Naman Vikshal Kongadi, Anil Kandulna and Independent candidate Basant Dungdung are in the contest for the seat. The assembly elections was necessitated after Kolebira MLA Anos Akka was sentenced to life imprisonment for murdering Manoj Kumar, a teacher by profession.

The Election Commission on November 22 announced the schedule for bypolls to fill the two vacant assembly seats of Jasdan in Gujarat and Kolebira in Jharkhand on December 20.

The date of issue of notification for the two by-polls was November 26 and the last date of nominations was December 3. Scrutiny of the nominations was done on December 4 and the last date of withdrawal of candidates' name was December 6.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Dec 19, 2018 11:55 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).