Bypoll voting under way in six seats; AJUP chief Humayun Kabir detained at Rejinagar party office

Voting began early on Tuesday (October 6, 2026) for byelections to five Assembly constituencies in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, and to one Lok Sabha constituency in Assam. The counting of votes is scheduled for Friday (October 9, 2026).

In West Bengal, Humayun Kabir, the chief of the Aam Janata Unnayan Party (AJUP), was detained and taken away from his party office in Rejinagar during polling. Party workers said the detention followed a verbal altercation with police personnel deployed on election duty. The AJUP has fielded Mr. Kabir's son, Golam Nabi Azad, from the Rejinagar seat.

There was no immediate public statement from the West Bengal Police on the circumstances of the detention, or on whether any case had been registered. In the absence of an official account, readers should treat descriptions of the incident as claims made by one side. Under the process laid down by the Election Commission of India (ECI), candidates, agents and voters may record complaints with the returning officer or the observer on duty, and such complaints are to be acknowledged and disposed of in a time-bound manner.

Rejinagar is among the more crowded contests of this round. The Bharatiya Janata Party, the Congress, the AJUP and the two factions of the Trinamool Congress are all in the fray, making it a multi-cornered fight in which local alliances and booth-level organisation are likely to matter as much as State-level sentiment.

In the high-profile Nandigram Assembly constituency, the bypoll was necessitated after Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari won two seats in the State elections earlier this year and chose to vacate this one. Nandigram has drawn national attention in earlier elections, and turnout figures there are being watched closely.

A related report has noted that about 19,000 voters in West Bengal are likely to miss these bypolls because appeals concerning their inclusion remain pending before the relevant tribunals. The disposal of such appeals is a matter that parties and civil society groups have flagged as relevant to the fairness of the exercise.

In Tamil Nadu, polling is under way in Madurantakam (SC) in Chengalpattu district and Dharapuram (SC) in Tiruppur district. Both Assembly segments fell vacant following the resignation of Maragatham Kumaravel and P. Sathyabama respectively.

In the Union Territory of Puducherry, voters are casting their ballots in the Thattanchavady Assembly constituency.

In Assam, the byelection to the Nagaon Lok Sabha constituency is witnessing a triangular contest among the Bharatiya Janata Party, the Congress and the All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF).

Bypolls fill seats that fall vacant between general elections, either because a member resigns, is disqualified, or vacates one of two seats won. Because they are held in small, defined areas, they are often read as a commentary on the standing of parties in power and in opposition, although analysts caution that local factors frequently outweigh national ones.

Voting is being conducted by the ECI under the Model Code of Conduct, which remains in force in the constituencies concerned until the results are declared. The Commission has repeatedly stated that its observers and micro-observers are deployed to ensure that polling is peaceful and that complaints are dealt with promptly.

This report will be updated as official information becomes available.