Bhubaneswar: The ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) retained the Jharsuguda Assembly seat with its candidate Deepali Das trouncing Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Tankadhar Tripathy by a whopping margin of 48,721 votes.
After the conclusion of all 19 rounds of counting of EVM votes and postal votes, Deepali secured a total of 1,07,198 votes while BJP nominee Tankadhar Tripathy managed to poll 58,477 votes. Congress candidate Tarun Pandey got 4496 votes.
The by-election to Jharsuguda Assembly constituency was held on May 10 recording a voter turnout of 79.21 per cent.
The Jharsuguda bypoll was necessitated following the murder of Deepali’s father Naba Kishore Das allegedly by a policeman on January 29.
Deepali’s victory was indicated since the beginning of vote counting as she had secured early leads. She continued to widen her lead after every round of counting. After 11th, she had already gained a lead of 28, 170 votes. She widened her and the margin crossed 40,000 mark at the end of round 15.
Deepali not only registered her victory with a huge margin but also broke her father’s record. Naba Das had bagged 98,620 voted in 2019 elections and won by a margin of 45,699 votes over his nearest candidate.
Thanking the people of Jharsuguda for their overwhelming support, Deepali said her spectacular was victory was ensured due to the love and blessings of the people. “I could win the election with a huge margin because of the support and love of people, she said, adding that she will meet Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik soon to seek his blessings and guidance.
She said she will work hard to fulfill the commitment made to the people make the dreams of my late father Naba Das a reality.
