Ganga Narayan Singh, who left AJSU Party to join the BJP and be the candidate for the April 17 Madhupur bypoll, filed his nomination on Tuesday in the presence of veterans from the saffron camp.

The 42-year-old will take on the ruling JMM-Congress-RJD alliance candidate and incumbent minister Hafizul Hassan. Hassan, a debutant in electoral politics, filed his nomination in the presence of chief minister Hemant Soren last week.

Singh filed nomination in four sets after which a massive rally was held at Ramleela ground in Madhupur with chants of "Jai Shri Ram". In 2019, he fought on an AJSU-P ticket and finished third with 45,000 seats.

State BJP president and Rajya Sabha MP Deepak Prakash, Godda MP Nishikant Dubey, former Dumka MLA Louis Marandi, were among those present at the rally.

Madhupur, which will be the third byelection to be held after the formation of the Hemant Soren government, will be significant since voters will be forced to choose between a minister and an MLA. The ruling alliance is more than confident of clinching victory.

BJP on the other hand is in no mood to give a walk-over. Addressing the rally in Madhupur, Marandi said, “The government’s nervousness can be assessed from the fact that even without being an MLA, Hemant government has made Hafizul a minister and now fielded him as a candidate. But he must remember that in 2009, a sitting CM (Shibu Soren) had lost his seat (Tamar).”

Notably, the Madhupur seat fell vacant last year after the demise of Haji Hussain Ansari, who was also a cabinet minister in the Hemant Soren government. Earlier this year, his son, Hafizul was inducted as a minister before being fielded as candidate.