Narendra Modi’s Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) lost control over another state after debacle in Maharashtra state widely believed that his CAA has cost him this loss.
Modi's BJP conceded defeat in the eastern state of Jharkhand, with an alliance of the main opposition Congress party and a regional bloc slated as Mukti Morcha and RJD party to take control of the resource-rich province.
The loss comes in the middle of a sometimes deadly wave of nationwide protests triggered by a new citizenship law, which critics say discriminates against Muslims and has brought thousands of people out on to the streets in opposition.
The polls in Jharkhand opened on Nov. 30, before the demonstrations kicked off and do not represent the current public mood. However, the BJP's defeat will be a shot in the arm for India's opposition parties, some of which have used popular anger against the Citizenship Amendment Act to their advantage.
The Modi government insists that the law is needed to help persecuted non-Muslim minorities from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan who came to India before 2015 by giving them Indian citizenship.
And in a show of strength on Monday, the BJP staged a protest, attended by several hundred people, in Kolkata in support of the CAA.
But groups opposed to the law gathered in the southern cities of Bangalore and Chennai, the capital New Delhi and north eastern Assam state, in the latest demonstrations against the CAA and the Modi government's proposal to conduct a nationwide National Register of Citizens.
In Assam, protests have been held since Dec. 10, initially turning violent but largely peaceful over the past week.
Meanwhile the Jharkhand BJP leader Raghubir Das has admitted his defeat. Polls were held in 81 seats of the state where the requirement to form government was 41. The anti BJP won in 45 seats bringing the fall of BJP government.