Overview
- Polling for the Nagaon Lok Sabha by-election is scheduled for Tuesday, October 6, with counting set for October 9 to fill the seat vacated by Pradyut Bordoloi.
- The main contest pits BJP nominee Devasish (Debashish) Sharma, a former Nagaon deputy commissioner who took voluntary retirement on September 3 and joined the BJP on September 8, against Congress’s Sibamoni Bora and AIUDF chief Badruddin Ajmal, whose late entry reshaped local arithmetic.
- Post‑delimitation changes in 2023 made Nagaon a Muslim-majority constituency of roughly 19 lakh electors, concentrating minority voting and making vote division between Congress and AIUDF a decisive factor.
- Congress has sought scrutiny of decisions taken while Sharma served as district election officer and has alleged incidents of intimidation, including a disputed attack on a Congress convoy on September 21, charges that rival parties reject.
- Parties frame the bypoll as a wider political test in Assam with the BJP viewing a win as momentum for its state ambitions and the Congress warning that a split Opposition vote could hand the seat to the ruling party.