The BJP’s Devyani Rana secured a decisive victory in the Nagrota Assembly bypoll on Thursday, collecting 42,143 votes and finishing more than 24,000 votes ahead of her closest competitor, former minister Harsh Dev Singh of the J&K National Panthers Party (India).

The ruling National Conference struggled significantly in this contest, ending up in a distant third position with its candidate, Shamim Begum, managing only 10,834 votes, according to the final Election Commission figures.

Devyani Rana, an Economics graduate from the University of California, is the daughter of the late Devender Rana, who had won the same seat for the BJP in the 2024 Assembly elections with a margin exceeding 30,000 votes over the NC’s Joginder Singh. Devender Rana passed away in October last year, prompting this bypoll. While the BJP’s margin dipped slightly compared to the previous election, the result underlines a more worrying trend for the National Conference — its voter base in the constituency appears to have weakened faster than that of any other major contender.