Kerala Assembly Election 2021, Dharmadam profile: CM Pinarayi Vijayan won red fortress in 2016 polls

Dharmadam Assembly Election 2021 | Dharmadam Assembly constituency was formed in 2008 by merging the erstwhile Edakkad constituency with some parts of the Thalassery constituency. Dharmadam is seen as a red fortress that favoured CPM in both the Assembly elections held in the constituency. The seat is currently held by Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, who hails from Pinarayi town in Dharmadam. Since Vijayan is expected to seek re-election from his home constituency, the UDF is reportedly mulling strong candidates who can take on the Kerala chief minister. Mathrubhumi reported that Congress is considering names like G Devarajan of Forward Bloc, AICC spokesperson Dr Shama Mohamed, INTUC leader C Raghunath, and KSU state vice-president VP Abdul Rasheed to field against Vijayan this election. Congress leader Mambaram Divakaran — who unsuccessfully fought the last two Assembly elections from Dharmadam — has revealed that he has no plans to contest against the chief minister.

Past election results and winners

In Dharmadam’s first Assembly election held in 2011, CPM’s KK Narayan bagged about 53 percent of the total votes polled, defeating Divakaran by a 15,162-vote margin. UDF-backed Divakaran was at the time in the fray as an Independent candidate as the Election Commission denied him Congress’ ‘hand’ symbol due to failure of producing an attested letter from the KPCC. Divakaran lost the seat for the second time in the 2016 election contesting on a Congress ticket against Vijayan. The Kerala chief minister had won the seat with 87,329 votes, which was 56.8 percent of the total votes polled. Divakaran had secured 50,424 votes, while BJP candidate Mohanan Mananthery came third with 12,763 votes.

Total electors, voter turnout, population

Electors: As per the final electorate published on 20 January, 2021, Dharmadam has 1,89,166 registered voters. Of this, 87,467 are male, 1,01,697 are female and two are transgender. The Assembly constituency will have 164 polling stations across eight panchayats. Voter turnout: In 2016, Dharmadam had 1.82 lakh registered voters. The Assembly election witnessed a voter turnout of 85.57 percent (1.52 lakh voters), with 67,612 male electors and 84,631 female electors showing up to vote. Population: Dharmadam comes under Kannur district, which is home to 22.5 lakh people — of whom 10.98 lakh are male and 11.5 lakh are female. The Assembly constituency consists of Anjarakandy, Chembilode, Kadambur, Muzhappilangad, and Peralasseri panchayats (in Kannur taluk); and Dharmadam, Pinarayi, and Vengad panchayats (in Thalaseery taluk).

Election date and timing

The Kerala Assembly/Niyama Sabha polls are likely to be held in April-May 2021 along with Assam, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal and Puducherry. The Kerala Legislative Assembly (Vidhan Sabha) has a total number of 140 seats, of which, 14 seats are reserved for the Scheduled Castes and two seats are reserved for the Scheduled Tribes. The outgoing Assembly has eight female MLAs and rest 132 are male MLAs. The incumbent Kerala Niyamasabha will expire on 1 June, 2021.