Pondicherry: Cong set to retain power

Pondicherry: Seeking to retain power in the Union Territory of Pondicherry, Congress slowly moved ahead as the DPA coalition by won six out of the 10 seats for which results were declared on Thursday.

While the ADMK-led front took the lead initially winning three seats, the Congress closed the gap and surged forward winning five seats. The DMK won one in the 30-member Assembly for which the elections were held on May 8.

Prominent among the Congress winners are former chief minister V Vaithilingam who won from from Nettapakkam for the sixth consecutive time. While Health Minister E Valsaraj, won the Mahe seat for the fifth time in a row.

PMK's Arulmurugan won the Mannadipet and PMC's V K Ganapathy won the Karaikal South constituency wresting the seat from Congress.

MDMK's P R Siva wrested the Thirunallar constituency from Congress and PMK's R K Anantharaman won the Ariankuppam, which was held by an independent candidate.

R Radhakrishnan of Congress retained Kuruvinatham while DMK's R Rajaraman won the Embalam (R) constituency. Rebel Congress candiate A Elumalai won from Oussudu (R) constituency.

CPI's national council member R Viswanathan won the Reddiarpalayam constituency. Chief Minister N Rangasamy retained the Thattanchavady constituency.

The ADMK and its key ally Pudducherry Munnetra Congress, formed by rebel Congressman and former home minister P Kannan, bagged two seats each.

The DMK, however, suffered a major setback when ADMK's Om Sakthi Sekar in Nellithope humbled its former chief minister R V Janakiraman.

DMK rebel A Marimuthu defeated Social Welfare Minister M Chandrakasu at Nedungadu (R) constituency.

DMK's nominee in Karaikal A M H Nazeem, retained the seat while S P Sivakuamar (DMK) retained the Rabhavan seat.

Other Congress winners are: P Angalane (Thirubuvanai), A V Sridhar (Paloor) and Malladi Krishna Rao (Yanam). PMC's N Anand wrested the Bussy seat from DMK and former education minister K Lakshminarayanan retained Cassicade.

ADMK's state unit secretary A Anbalagan also retained his Oupalam seat.