Chennai, Oct 8:
The votes polled in the Madurantakam and Dharapuram Assembly constituencies in Tamil Nadu will be counted on Friday, with the results of the two closely watched by-elections expected to be declared the same day.
The by-elections were necessitated after AIADMK MLAs K Maragatham Kumaravel of Madurantakam and P Sathyabama of Dharapuram resigned their Assembly seats and joined the Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK). Both have been re-nominated by the TVK. The contests have drawn attention as the first direct electoral test for the TVK government after it assumed office in May.
In Madurantakam (SC), 27 candidates are in the fray, including TVK’s K Maragatham Kumaravel, DMK’s I Paranthaman, AIADMK’s K Kanitha Sampath, CPI(M)’s P Suganthi and NTK’s G Janakiraman.
In Dharapuram (SC), 22 candidates are contesting. The principal contestants include TVK’s P Sathyabama, DMK’s S Suganya, AIADMK’s K Bhanumathi, CPI’s P Lakshmanan and NTK’s M Karthika. The constituency has 2,23,306 voters and 320 polling stations.
After polling ended on October 6, the EVMs and VVPAT units were sealed in the presence of candidates and their representatives and shifted to strong rooms.
With counting scheduled for tomorrow, all eyes will now be on the round-wise trends, postal ballot votes, margins and final results from Madurantakam and Dharapuram.