The Awami League's Shahjahan Alam Saju won Sunday’s by-election to Brahmanbari-2, comprising Sarail and Ashuganj, by a landslide, securing the constituency for his party for the first time since 1973.
Saju bagged 66,314 votes, while his nearest competitor, independent candidate Advocate Ziaul Haque Mridha, received 37,758 votes.
Voting went underway at 8am at 132 centres and continued till 4pm.
The constituency has 410,072 votes and the turnout on election day was 27.13%.
Mridha alleged rigging in the election, telling reporters in the afternoon that there had been irregularities at seven polling stations.
He added that the voter lists given to almost all the polling stations in Sarail were flawed, calling the act deliberate.
The Parliament Secretariat October 4 declared the seat vacant after the passing of lawmaker Abdus Sattar Bhuiyan on September 30.
After a period of political inactivity after the 2008 general election, Sattar made a successful comeback in the 2018 polls as a BNP candidate.
He was one of seven BNP leaders who resigned from parliament on December 11 in line with a decision of the party.
Later he decided to contest the subsequent by-polls to the constituency as an independent candidate, which followed his expulsion from the BNP on on January 2.
