Puducherry Assembly election 2021, Kamaraj Nagar constituency: Congress won seat in 2011, 2016 elections and 2019 bypoll

Constituency number 10 Kamaraj Nagar lies in the Puducherry district of the Union Territory of Puducherry. Electors and voter turnout in 2016 election According to the Election Commission data, there were 33,299 registered voters in the constituency in 2016. Of these, 16,380 were men, 16,917 women, and two persons belonging to the third gender. A total of 25,774 voters had cast their ballots and the poll percentage was 77. 40 percent. Results of previous Assembly elections In 2011, Congress’ V Vaithilingam defeated CPI candidate Nara Kalainathan by a margin of 6029 votes. Vaithilingam got 12, 570 votes while Kalainathan got 6,541. Vaithilingam who was the chief minister of the Union Territory from 1991-96, had taken over office again in 2008 after N Rangasamy resigned as chief minister following months of squabbles within the Congress and the Puducherry Cabinet.  Before the 2011 elections, Rangasamy floated the All India NR Congress. In 2016, Vaithilingam defeated AIADMK’s P Ganesan and retained the constituency. While Vathilngam secured 11,618 votes, Ganesan got 6,512 votes. However, the seat fell vacant after Vaithilingam was elected to the Lok Sabha. The Congress retained the seat in the 2019 bypoll, with its candidate A John Kumar winning over his nearest rival Bouvanesvarane of the AINRC by a margin of 7,170 votes. John Kumar tendered his resignation on 16 February, pushing the Congress government, which also has the support of three DMK MLAs and the lone Independent MLA, to the brink. Puducherry will vote in a single phase on 6 April along with neighbouring state of Tamil Nadu while counting of votes will take place on 2 May.