Shimla, Jul 13 (IANS): Vote counting for Himachal Pradesh's bypoll for three Assembly constituencies began on Saturday, with 13 candidates in the fray for the contest mainly between the state-ruling Congress and the main Opposition BJP.

As much as 70.7 per cent voting was recorded in Dehra, Hamirpur and Nalagarh seats on Wednesday.

The polling was conducted to fill vacancies created by the resignation of incumbent members, all Independents, who are now in the fray as BJP nominees.

In a straight contest between traditional arch-rivals, the Congress and the BJP, the stakes are high for Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu with his wife Kamlesh Thakur making her electoral debut from Dehra in Kangra district.

This constituency was carved out after delimitation in 2010 and the Congress has never won this seat.

The Chief Minister had campaigned aggressively in Dehra, compared to two other seats, to ensure victory for Kamlesh Thakur, who is in the fray against BJP nominee Hoshiyar Singh, who won the seat as an Independent candidate in 2022 for the second consecutive time.

The main opposition BJP, which has won all four seats in the just concluded parliamentary elections, has fielded K.L. Thakur from Nalagarh and Ashish Sharma from Hamirpur, where they will be pitted against Congress' Hardeep Bawa and Pushpendra Verma, respectively.

Both K.L. Thakur and Ashish Sharma won the seats as Independent candidates in 2022 before joining the BJP earlier this year.

The duo, along with Hoshiyar Singh, resigned from the Assembly in March and joined the BJP.