Balussery sends Sachin Dev to Assembly

In LDF fortress, the young candidate wins by whopping margin of 21,132 votes

K.M. Sachin Dev of the Left Democratic Front (LDF), one of the youngest candidates in the fray in the 2021 Assembly election, has retained Balussery, with a whopping margin of 20,372 votes. The State secretary of the Students’ Federation of India scored 91,839 votes of the total 1,82,253 polled in the constituency while his nearest opponent Dharmajan Bolgatty of the Indian National Congress scored 71,467 votes. Libin Bhaskar, the Bharatiya Janata Party candidate, scored 16,490 votes.

Though Mr. Dharmajan had maintained a slight lead in the beginning of the counting, Mr. Dev soon came to the top and maintained the lead throughout.

Balussery has been a fortress of the LDF for the last 35 years and has been a traditional socialist stronghold. However, it has shifted its loyalty between the United Democratic Front and the LDF when it came to Lok Sabha polls. Ever since it was made a Schedule Caste reserved constituency in 2011, Purushan Kadalundi of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)] has represented it. He had won the constituency in 2011 with a margin of 9,882 votes and had increased the margin to 15,464 votes in 2016. Mr. Dev has outdone both feats to retain the constituency this time.

Mr. Dharmajan had several hurdles before him, including strong protests from local Congress workers against his candidature. His popularity as a comedian in Malayalam cinema had attracted crowds at every meeting he attended. However, the crowds seem not to have translated into votes.

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