Candidates are going door to door in last minute canvassing ahead of Brahmanbaria-2 (Ashuganj and Sarail) by-election scheduled for February 1.
The top favourites are the BNP's two expelled leaders, who are contesting the polls as independent candidates. Former advisor to BNP chairperson Abdus Sattar Bhuiyan will be sharing the ground with former party mate Abu Asif Ahmed.
The other two candidates are Jatiya Party's Abdul Hamid Bhashani and Zaker Party's Zahirul Islam Jewel. But local people are sensing a tight fight between Sattar and Asif.
Sattar was an elected lawmaker from Brahmanbaria and Camilla five times as a BNP candidate, including the 11th parliamentary election held in 2018. Abu Asif is also not far behind in popularity as he was elected Ashuganj upazila chairman during the tenure of the current government.
Four candidates – three ruling Awami League leaders and one expelled Jatiya Party leader – withdrew their nominations. Local people speculate that the AL leaders withdrew only to make the way easy for Sattar to come out victorious.
However, local Awami League refuted the allegation and said that some AL men joined Sattar's campaign on personal grounds.
The AL has never won in the constituency since independence. Now, they have initiated the tricky move to tighten their grip on the local politics, locals say.
Moreover, the decision of the BNP to not participate in the election created discontent among local leaders of the party. The AL wanted to take advantage of the fact to further weaken their rivals.
There are allegations that the AL leaders who wanted to contest the by-polls were asked to withdraw their nomination papers.
Local AL leader Moin Uddin is one of the independent aspirants to withdraw nomination from the by-polls. He came out second in the latest general election from the constituency.
While inspecting campaigning by different candidates, not much enthusiasm among the locals was witnessed ahead of the polls.
Some handful of leaders and workers are canvassing for their candidates while roads and markets have been covered with posters and banners ahead of February 1 voting.
Local people attributed this lack of interest in campaigning to the absence of AL and BNP candidates on the ground.
This has helped Sattar to gain grounds as his son Mainul Hasan Bhuiyan was seen coordinating with local AL leaders for his father's campaigning.
On the other hand, many BNP supporters did not take Sattar's move to contest the by-polls going against BNP's decisions and thus the vote bank for Abu Asif only got bigger.
On December 10, five MPs from the BNP resigned from parliament as part of their ongoing anti-government movement. Sattar was expelled from all posts of the party on 1 January after the five-time lawmaker resigned from the post of the party chairperson's adviser on December 29.
The move came after Abdus Sattar had collected a nomination form for Brahmanbaria-2 constituency by-polls as an independent candidate.
Later, the Election Commission announced February 1 to hold polls for the vacant seats.
Shamim Ahmed, district coordinator of Sushashoner Jonno Nagorik (Sujan) thinks that Sattar's recent moves have harmed his popularity and his former party men are very skeptical about him now.
Sattar hails from Sarail while Asif from Ashuganj.
There are 2.41 lakh voters in Sarail while the number is 1.32 lakh for Ashuganj. Such numbers will play a key part in the results of the upcoming by-election, locals say.
Mainul Hasan Bhuyan, Sattar's son, told this correspondent that they are hopeful of victory as his father will receive votes from supporters from different parties.
JaPa candidate Bhasani said that he will come out as the winner if voting takes place in a fair manner.
Abu Asif said he is destined to win as many AL and BNP supporters are backing him in the by-polls.