Amid a tough fight between ruling LDF and UDF candidate in Puthuppally, Congress candidate Chandy Oommen, son of former Kerala CM Oommen Chandy, leads with a comfortable margin of 39,800, as per early trends at 11 AM. The elections were held to fill the seat vacated after Congressman Oommen Chandy's demise on September 5. The byelection is crucial both for LDF and UDF factions mainly since its held before Lok Sabha Elections 2024.
Achu Ooommen, sister of the candidate, told Manorama, "This result is an answer to the witchhunt we had to endure all these years."
On Friday morning, the ballots cast in the Puthuppally constituency's byelection, which featured a heated contest between the LDF and the UDF, began to be counted. The counting at the special station set up at a nearby college, which was scheduled to start at 8 am, was delayed for a short while.
In the first round, postal and service ballots were collected for counting. Within a few hours, an initial trend is anticipated to be recognised, the Election Commission sources said earlier. On Tuesday, 72.86 per cent of the total registered 1,76,412 voters had cast their vote, according to the Chief Electoral Officer.
A slightly lesser number of people cast ballots in the by-election for the Puthuppally Assembly seat than in the state assembly elections in 2021, which saw a turnout of about 74 percent.
The byelection, which was held a few months before the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, is being viewed as politically vital since the Congress wants to keep its long-standing stronghold while the ruling CPI (M) hopes to gain fresh ground by winning.
Oommen Chandy held the seat for five decades without any pause till his demise on July 18. This is the first election in the absence of Oommen Chandy's candidature since 1970s.
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