Date:12/05/2006 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2006/05/12/stories/2006051211540500.htm

Kerala - Palakkad

Achuthanandan romps home with a record majority

Staff Reporter

Ahead in the eight panchayat areas of the constituency Ahead in the eight panchayat areas of the Malampuzha constituency

The all-time high victory margin is 20,017 votes
The previous best is 18,799 in 1996

E.K. Nayanar had scored margins of 15,557 and 16,596 in 1980 and 1982

Retains Malampuzha seat with an all-time high margin.

PALAKKAD: V.S. Achuthanandan, Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Polit Bureau member, retained his Malampuzha Assembly seat with an all-time high margin of 20,017 votes in the constituency when counting of votes was completed on Thursday. In the 2001 elections, his margin was 4,703 votes.

Mr. Achuthanandan got 64,775 of the 1,15,306 votes polled, which comes to 56.18 per cent of the votes cast, as against the 44,758 of the Congress candidate, Satheeshan Pacheni, his immediate rival.

In 2001, Mr. Achuthanandan got 53,661 of the 1,10,469 votes polled, with his vote share being 48.58 per cent.

This time, the Bharatiya Janata Party candidate, P.J. Thomas, got 4,348 votes as against the 5,190 the party won in 2001.

From the beginning of the counting, Mr. Achuthanandan established a clear lead. He was ahead in all the eight panchayat areas of the constituency, leading in 120 of the 137 booths.

His margin is more than those obtained by the late E.K. Nayanar, former Chief Minister, and the party leader T. Sivadasa Menon, who, together, had won here on five occasions.

Past majorities

Only the CPI(M) had won the seat since its inception in 1965. In the first elections, M.P. Kunhiraman won it with a margin of 14,351 votes. In 1967, he retained the seat with a margin of 15,869.

In 1970, V. Krishnadas won the seat with a margin of 19,853. In 1977, P.V. Kunhikannan got a margin of 4,496. In 1980, Nayanar won it with a margin of 15,557. He retained the seat in 1982 with a higher margin of 16,596.

In 1987, T. Sivadasa Menon won the seat with a margin of 10,304 votes. In 1991, he retained it with a margin of 17,991. In 1996, his margin rose to 18,799.

Mr. Achuthanandan's candidature here, with many believing him to be the chief ministerial candidate of the Left Democratic Front, had aroused much interest. There were allegations of huge flow of funds from `mafia gangs' to get him defeated, but Mr. Achuthanandan won huge margins in the industrial belts where these gangs allegedly operate.

He got the highest margins of 3,891 votes in the Marutharode panchayat area and 3,103 in Pudussery. These are in the Kanjikode-Pudussery-Walayar industrial belt.