Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and AIADMK chief J Jayalalithaa trounced her nearest rival and CPI candidate C Mahendran with a huge margin of over 1.5 lakh votes as the results for Radha Krishnan Nagar assembly seat by-election was declared on Tuesday.
Jayalalithaa polled 160,432 votes while her nearest rival, Mahendran, got just 9,710 votes – a victory margin of 150,722 votes.
The total electorate in the constituency was around 245,000, and the Chief Minister bagged more than 50 percent of the total votes polled.
As noisy celebrations erupted at the AIADMK headquarters and outside Jayalalithaa’s residence, Tamil Nadu Governor K Rosaiah congratulated her over her landslide win, an official statement said.
AIADMK activists and leaders generously distributed sweets to all and sundry and burst crackers to celebrate the thumping victory – a record of sorts for Jayalalithaa.
An elated Jayalalithaa thanked voters and AIADMK supporters for her massive victory and said the result was a precursor for the 2016 assembly elections.
This is the seventh by-poll victory for AIADMK since it came to power in 2011. The party has won all the by-polls held since 2011.
As counting of votes began at 8 am, Jayalalithaa began to build a massive lead over her rivals.
The Tamil Nadu Chief Minister was said to leading with 127204 votes after the 13th round of counting of votes. Her main opponent C Mahendran was lagging behind with 7368 votes, as per reports.
