Puducherry Assembly election 2021, Thattanchavady profile: DMK wrested seat from AINRC in 2019 bypoll

Thattanchavady is constituency number nine in the Union Territory of Puducherry. The Thattanchavady constituency was considered to be the bastion of former chief minister and All India NR Congress founder N Ranagasamy, who held the seat from 1991 till 2011. Electors and voter turnout in 2016 election As per the Election Commissions’s data, there were 30,551 registered electors ( 14,538 men, 16,010 women and three persons belonging to the third gender) in the 2016 election. As many as 23,704 voters had exercised their franchise and the poll percentage was 77.59 percent. Results of previous elections In 2006, Rangasamy, who was with the Congress then, trounced ADMK’s T Gunasekaran. While Rangasamy got 27,024 votes, Gunasekaran managed to get only 2,026 votes. The AINRC retained hold over the current Thhattanchavady constituency since it was carved out of the older constituency of the same name, along with Indira Nagar and Kadirgamam, but the seat was wrested by the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) in the 2019 by-poll. In 2011, AINRC’s Ashok Anand defeated Independent candidate N. Arjunan by a margin of 10, 506 votes. Incumbent candidate Anand was once again elected from the constituency in 2016 with 12,754 votes. His closest rival was CPI’s K Sethu alias Sethuselvam, who received 5,296 votes. However, in November 2018, Anand was disqualified following his conviction in a disproportionate assets case and the constituency was declared vacant. In the by-elections held in 2019, the DMK stormed the AINRC stronghold, with its candidate K Venkatesan polling 10,906 votes His nearest rival, AINRC candidate P Nedunchezhian (Rangasamy’s nephew) garnered 9,367 votes. 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.