The Bharatiya Janata Party has nominated Kamlesh Shah as its candidate for the Assembly byelection in the Amarwara (ST) constituency in Madhya Pradesh’s Chhindwara.
The by-election was necessitated after Mr. Shah, a former loyalist of former Chief Minister Kamal Nath and a two-term Amarwara MLA, had quit the Congress and gave up his legislative membership to join the BJP ahead of the Lok Sabha election.
On June 10, the Election Commission announced byelections on 13 seats across the country, including Amarwara, where polling will take place on July 10 while the votes will be counted on July 13.
Mr. Shah was one of many Congress leaders and loyalists of Mr. Nath in Chhindwara who quit the Opposition party in the run-up to the Lok Sabha election. The exodus of leaders turned out to be one of the biggest factors in the BJP’s success in breaching Mr. Nath’s bastion and defeating his son Nakul Nath.
BJP candidate Vivek Bunty Sahu won the parliamentary election by a margin of more than 1.13 lakh.
Mr. Shah’s switch on March 29 had also led to a war of words between the BJP and Congress leaders. After Mr. Nakul Nath termed him a “traitor”, M.P. CM Mohan Yadav was quick to link the remarks with the whole tribal community and sought an apology from the former.
While Mr. Nakul Nath was seeking a second term from Chhindwara, his father represented the Lok Sabha constituency nine times, which has long been synonymous to his family.
