While it is dubbed as a weakling in the Maha Vikas Aghadi, the Congress had an opportunity to flex its muscles, thanks to the local body bypoll results in six districts. Contrary to popular expectation, the century-old party gave the single largest party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a neck-and-neck fight, winning the maximum numbers among the MVA partners. In fact, it won more seats than the BJP in the panchayat samitis, even as it fell short of a few to match BJP numbers in the zilla parishad polls.

For non-starters, the Zilla Parishad segments are bigger than the panchayat samiti ones. Both are essentially rural segments, where the Congress, fighting against the BJP and MVA partners, has retained the seats and won some more than in the regular polls that were held after the MVA came to power in a dramatic manner, with the sole purpose of stopping the BJP in its tracks. The bypolls did not change the power equations in the six districts, but created concerns for the BJP which will be trying to retain power next year in the majority local bodies that it had won when in power between 2014 and 2019.