A severe drubbing for Pon Radhakrishnan

Madurai: The lone BJP MP from Tamil Nadu in the outgoing NDA government and union minister of state for shipping, road transportation, highways and finance Pon Radhakrishnan who is often seen surrounded by hundreds of people, was seen sitting alone under a temporary tin sheet structure at the counting centre in Nagercoil since Thursday morning.

This time, he had expected defeat at the hands of Congress candidate H Vasantha Kumar (who Radhakrishnan had defeated by a margin of 1.28 lakh votes in 2014) as he was trailing his Congress opponent by a few thousand votes right from the first round. At the end of the 26th round (of the total of 28), Pon Radhakrishnan had secured 3,44,885 votes against Vasantha Kumar’s 5,96,269 votes, trailing by a margin of 2,51,384 votes. This would be the biggest losing margin for the two-time MP who has been contesting for the eighth time in the same constituency since 1991.

Vasantha Kumar’s victory also disproved the belief that the party that wins at Kanyakumari will form the government at the Centre – which has been the case till 2014. This is the first victory for the Congress after the constituency, that was known as Nagercoil from the 1950s, was renamed Kanyakumari in 2008. With Thursday’s victory, Congress MPs have been elected in the southernmost constituency on 11 occasions, including twice by the NCO (1971 and 1977) and as many times by the TMC (1996 and 1998).

Expressing regret over his party not forming the government at the Centre, Vasantha Kumar thanked voters for their trust in him based on their understanding of what he has been doing as the sitting MLA of Nanguneri assembly segment in neighbouring Tirunelveli district. He was talking to reporters at the counting centre late in the evening.