Soreng-Chakung & Namchi-Singhithang bypolls on Nov 13

GANGTOK,: Bypolls for 47 Assembly seats across 13 States including the vacant Namchi-Singhithang and Soreng-Chakung constituencies of Sikkim will be held on November 13, the Election Commission of India (ECI) announced on Tuesday.

The bye-election gazette is being issued on October 18 (Friday) with October 25 as the last date for making nominations. Scrutiny of nominations will take place on October 28 while October 30 is the last date for withdrawal of candidates.

As per the ECI, the date for polling is November 13 (Wednesday) with counting of votes to be held on November 23 (Saturday).

During the Assembly elections held earlier this year, the ruling SKM had swept 31 seats out of 32 seats including the Namchi-Singhithang and Soreng-Chakung constituencies. Chief Minister & SKM president PS Golay secured thumping victories from Soreng-Chakung and Rhenock constituencies. He later vacated the Soreng-Chakung seat.

His spouse Krishna Rai had similarly won with a huge margin from Namchi-Singhithang and a day after taking oath as the legislator in the Sikkim Legislative Assembly, she resigned as the MLA from Namchi-Singhithang.

Speaking with SIKKIM EXPRESS, SKM spokesperson Bikash Basnet said the SKM, under the leadership of party president & Chief Minister PS Golay welcomes the bypoll announcement and reaffirms its commitment to participate in accordance with the Election Commission’s Model Code of Conduct. In the next 2-3 days, the SKM will constitute its Parliamentary Committee to decide the party’s candidates and strategize for the two Assembly seats bye-elections, he said.

Basnet added that SKM had started its groundwork for the bye-elections in Namchi-Singhithang and Soreng-Chakung immediately after the two seats were vacated in June. He expressed the SKM’s confidence to secure overwhelming victories in both the constituencies during the bypolls. We had won with huge margins from these two seats in the Assembly elections earlier this year and we are confident to secure even higher victory margins in the bye-elections with above 90% votes, he said.

“The party is confident of securing a landslide victory in both constituencies. Sikkim has seen significant progress in all sectors under the leadership of Prem Singh Tamang (Golay) and this bye-election is assured to be another milestone for SKM similar to the historic results of recent general elections,” said the SKM spokesperson.