The veteran BJP leader Jayprakash Majumdar and CPI-M leader Golam Rabbi today filed their nomination papers before the returning officer at Tehatta in Nadia for the by-election of the Karimpur assembly seat, which fell vacant after TMC’s Mahua Moitra emerged victorious from Krishnagar LS seat in the last parliamentary polls.

Confident about his victory in the bypoll, Majumdar said the ruling party is trying to mislead people about the NRC and on the basis of their distorted versions; they are trying to woo voters for the bypolls. “But I believe that people have faith in the BJP-led government and they will exercise their franchise in my favour,” Majumdar said.

The BJP candidate was accompanied by Mukul Roy, Mahadev Sarkar, BJP’s Nadia north district president and the party’s legislative member Subrangshu Roy.

Reacting to a question, Mr Roy came down heavily on the chief minister Mamata Banerjee and said, “The chief minister perhaps has no knowledge about the definition of infiltrators and refugees. She is delivering wrong information about these terms while speaking about NRC. Our party is firm about combating this type of canard. All Hindus, Matuas and Namo-Sudras will get citizenship under Citizen Amendment Bill. Even, those minorities from Bangladesh who came here after 1971 will get citizenship. So, don’t bother with the false information the ruling party is trying to circulate in the locality across the assembly constituency,” Mr Roy said.

In the last parliamentary polls, the BJP has gained support of the local people, but the support base has now lowered to some extent as the local people became worried about the NRC issue. The BJP leadership, however, is confident about the party’s candidate. They have already started a counter campaign against the “false information” spread by the ruling party.

The CPI-M candidate, Mr Rabbi. was also confident about his winning in the byelection. “This constituency was dominated by the Left Front for long periods. Also, it is dominated by the minority community. Our candidate will get support from minority community on NRC issue,” a CPI-M leader said.