The Bharatiya Janata Party leaves nothing to chance. Having lost the Badrinath assembly seat in the 2022 by-election and the Ayodhya Lok Sabha seat in the 2024 general election, the party cannot afford to lose another holy place for devout Hindus.

No wonder, then, that chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami is personally overseeing the BJP’s campaign in the temple town. He even accompanied BJP candidate Asha Nautiyal when she filed her nomination.

Recent electoral history favors the BJP. Four of the five elections held in the last twenty years ended in favor of female candidates. In this constituency, the number of female voters (45,775) is more than male voters (44,765). Not only are they more vocal than men, women are likely to decide this year’s contest between Nautiyal of the BJP and Manoj Rawat of the Congress. Rawat, a Rajput, and Nautiyal, a Brahmin, are former MLAs from the constituency.

Lack of job opportunities and migration of job-seeking men to the plains continue to be electoral issues in Kedarnath assembly segment, which includes Rudraprayag, Didihat, Pithoragarh and Dwarhat. This month’s crucial by-election was necessitated by the death of BJP MLA Shaila Rani Rawat.

Asha Nautiyal had won this seat in 2002 and 2007, while Manoj Rawat had won from here in 2017. Ironically, Rawat’s victory was partly due to Nautiyal, who had contested as an independent, rejecting the BJP ticket in 2017. She overshadowed her arch-rival Shaila Rani Rawat by giving her a large number of votes and ensured Manoj Rawat’s victory. While the punished BJP has once again turned its back on Asha Nautiyal, Rawat is seeking votes on the strength of his work as a legislator.