Nagaon Bypoll: Ajmal's Entry Sets Up Four-Cornered Fight in Assam

The contest for the Nagaon parliamentary byelection on October 6 has taken final shape, with the All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF) naming its founder and chief, Badruddin Ajmal, as its candidate. His late entry turns the seat into a four-cornered fight.

Also in the fray are former legislator Sibamoni Bora of the Congress, former bureaucrat Devasish Sharma of the BJP and academic Abdul Salam of the Trinamool Congress.

Nagaon marks the first major direct clash between the BJP and the Congress since the ruling National Democratic Alliance swept 102 of 126 Assembly seats in April. The AIUDF's switch from former student leader Rejaul Karim Sarkar to its founder is seen as a significant move that could reshape Opposition politics in a State where the ruling party currently holds near-absolute sway.

The byelection comes amid a wider churn in the Opposition camp. On September 3, the Congress formally ended its alliance with Akhil Gogoi's Raijor Dal, with Leader of the Opposition Wazid Ali Choudhury saying the party had grown weary of its ally's repeated criticism of the Congress and its leaders. The former junior partner had trained its fire on Lok Sabha MP and Assam Congress chief Gaurav Gogoi, questioning the extent of his engagement with the flood crisis.

Raijor Dal has chosen not to field a candidate in Nagaon, with its chief saying the decision was aimed at preventing the rise of communal forces. The party, which won two seats in the April election, is nonetheless positioning itself for a larger share of the Opposition space over the BJP-led government's full term. It had hoped to add a third seat, but a Congress veto led it to drop Sherman Ali Ahmed as its candidate from Mandia; he subsequently joined the Trinamool Congress and secured its sole seat.

With only one non-Muslim among the Congress's 19 winning candidates, Raijor Dal's longer-term aim appears to be expanding at the expense of the principal Opposition party among Assamese Hindu voters — a prospect Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had predicted in February.

The minority vote is equally unsettled. The Congress reclaimed much of this constituency from the AIUDF in the last Assembly election after declining to renew their 2021 tie-up, but weak showings in seats with thin minority concentration leave it exposed to another shift. Ajmal had claimed as early as August 16 that the Congress would not field a Muslim candidate in the bypoll.

By contesting himself, the AIUDF chief — currently an MLA from Binnakandi in central Assam and a former three-time MP from Dhubri in western Assam — is making a full bid to reclaim his party's core support base. Nagaon has four Muslim-majority Assembly segments — Dhing, Rupahihat, Lahorighat and Samaguri — along with four others: Nagaon-Batadraba, Jagiroad, Morigaon and Raha. More than 55% of the constituency's voters are minorities.

With their respective picks, the BJP and the AIUDF have squeezed the Congress from both sides. State BJP chief Dilip Saikia and the Chief Minister have acknowledged the odds in what is a 'non-traditional' seat for the party. The BJP is banking on non-Muslim consolidation behind Devasish Sharma, a former Nagaon Deputy Commissioner whose shift from bureaucrat on September 3 to BJP politician five days later drew Congress criticism. The Chief Minister has said the strategy is to maximise gains in the four non-minority-heavy segments and narrow deficits elsewhere.

The candidatures of Ajmal and Salam mean every Muslim vote will be contested. A Congress win would require support across communities — essentially a revival of its old winning formula. Having won the Lok Sabha seat twice in succession even as it slipped elsewhere against the BJP, the party could not risk alienating non-minority voters with a Muslim candidate.

Gaurav Gogoi had predicted victory even before the party named its candidate. A win would signal that a diverse electorate, bridging religious divides, can vote a Congress candidate first past the post and give the party a credible platform to take on the BJP five years from now. A defeat would suggest that the factor behind its Assembly rout persists — an inability to appeal to Assamese Hindu voters beyond a certain threshold.