VELLORE: The AIADMK, which faced a huge defeat in the urban local body polls, has lost its deposit in 25 corporation wards in Vellore. Out of the 60 wards in the corporation, the AIADMK had contested in 56 and won in only seven.
Of the 2,61,340 votes polled in the corporation, the party got only 62,339 (23.85%), which was less than half of the total number of votes secured by the DMK. The DMK received 1,33,835 (51.21%) votes and won in 44 wards including winning unopposed in two wards.
Meanwhile, the BJP secured a meagre 8,947 (3.42%) votes and lost deposit in 31 of the 35 wards it contested in. The national party, however, managed to pull off a lone victory. Its candidate S Sumathi, who contested from ward no. 18, won the corporation councillor post. She secured 2057 votes, defeating candidates from AIADMK and Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK's alliance). Sumathi won by a margin of 109 votes, with the runner-up S Megala from MDMK ending up with 1,948 votes.
The Congress (INC), which faced the polls in alliance with DMK, fought in three wards and lost all of them.
The AIADMK's result in municipalities was no better, as the DMK showed its dominance there too. In Pernambut municipality, the AIADMK got 3,319 votes against the 30,726 votes polled, a meagre vote share of 10.80 per cent.
The DMK, on the other hand, garnered 15,037 votes (48.93%), emerging victorious by winning 17 out of the 21 wards in the municipality. The AIADMK could not win a single ward in the municipality.
The party, however, put up a decent fight in the Gudiyattam municipality, where the AIADMK-led alliance secured 21,125 (36.63%) votes out of the 57,665 votes polled. They won 10 out of the 36 wards. Here, the DMK-led alliance captured 23 wards and got 24,765 (42.94%) votes.
Vellore urban district secretary SRK Appu told TNIE, "The victory of the DMK came by distributing large amounts of cash to woo voters. It threatened candidates to withdraw their nominations, but we (AIADMK) fielded candidates who are service-minded. They scared voters as they have the power to stop government welfare schemes from reaching people if their candidates were not elected."