CHENNAI: Chief Minister and AIADMK general secretary J Jayalalithaa on Tuesday won the by-election to the RK Nagar Assembly constituency by a whopping margin of 1,50,722 votes, while all the other 27 candidates, including CPI leader C Mahendran and activist Traffic K R Ramaswamy, forfeited their deposit.
While Jayalalithaa secured a huge 88.43 per cent (1,60,432 votes) of the total votes polled (1,82,420), her nearest rival C Mahendran polled 9,710 votes. As he could not secure one-sixth of the total votes, he lost his deposit. Ramaswamy secured 4,590 votes. Thanking voters for electing her with such a huge margin, Jayalalithaa, in a statement here, said the, “AIADMK’s victory in this by-election is a precursor to the 2016 Assembly elections.”
Having polled more than 1.6 lakh votes, Jayalalithaa created a record of sorts by becoming the first candidate in the constituency, since 1977, to have polled the highest number of votes. The previous record in terms of number of votes polled in the constituency was 84,462 by ex-AIADMK MLA P K Sekarbabu (now with the opposition DMK) in 2006 and P Vetrivel’s (AIADMK) 83,777 in 2011.
The margin was an all-time record in the history of RK Nagar, which has so far witnessed ten elections since 1977. The previous highest victory margin was registered by DMK’s S P Sarguna Pandian who won by 43,081 votes in the 1996 Assembly polls.
This is seventh consecutive victory for the ruling AIADMK in the by-elections held since May 2011. By-elections have been held for Tiruchy West, Sankarankovil (SC), Pudukkottai, Yercaud (ST), Alandur and Srirangam constituencies and the AIADMK won all of them.
Jayalalithaa's Campaigning Trail: