In a major political upset, Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief and outgoing chief minister Mamata Banerjee has been defeated in her home turf of Bhabanipur by Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Suvendu Adhikari.
Adhikari, opposition leader in the outgoing Assembly, secured the seat with a winning margin of 15,105 votes.
The high-stakes counting of votes took place at Sakhawat Memorial School in South Kolkata. Although Banerjee maintained an initial lead during the early stages of the count, Adhikari began to close the gap as the afternoon progressed.
By approximately 7:45pm local time, the BJP leader had overtaken the TMC chief by 2,956 votes, a lead that ultimately widened to secure his victory. Adhikari contested two seats in this election, Bhabanipur and Nandigram, and was successful in both.
In Nandigram, he defeated his TMC rival by a margin of 10,000 votes. Notably, in the previous Assembly election, Adhikari had also defeated Banerjee in Nandigram by a margin of 1,956 votes.
For this election cycle, Banerjee chose to contest solely from the Bhabanipur seat. Consequently, her defeat in this constituency means the outgoing chief minister will not have a place in the Legislative Assembly.
The atmosphere at the counting centre was marked by tension between TMC and BJP supporters. During the proceedings, both candidates were present at the venue, where the Election Commission confiscated their mobile phones as per standard regulations.
Upon departing the counting centre as the results shifted in Adhikari’s favour, Banerjee levelled serious allegations of electoral malpractice, claiming that more than 100 seats had been “looted” during the election.
