Jaipur, Feb 1 (IANS): The counting of votes for the Rajasthan bypolls, which were held this week in two Lok Sabha and one assembly constituency, began at 8 a.m. on Thursday.

While the counting of votes for the Alwar and Ajmer Lok Sabha seats would take place in the respective constituencies, the counting for Mandalgarh assembly seat would take place in Bhilwara.

A total of 42 candidates were in the fray for the three seats.

In Alwar, Jaswant Singh Yadav of BJP faced Karan Singh Yadav of the Congress, while Raghu Sharma of Congress contested BJP's Ram Swaroop Lamba in Ajmer.

The main contenders for the Mandalgarh seat were BJP's Shakti Singh Hada and Congress's Vivek Dhakad.

Both the parties have campaigned aggressively, as the bypolls results were expected to reveal the mood for the Assembly polls ahead.

The bypolls were necessitated after the death of BJP MPs Sanwarlal Jat from Ajmer, Mahant Chand Nath Yogi from Alwar, and MLA Kirti Kumari from Mandalgarh.