It is the time now for the All India N R Congress (AINRC) to ponder over what led to it’s debacle in the assembly elections,the result of which was announced here yesterday.
Not only the number of sitting N R Congress members came down from the 15 in 2011 to eight in this election,but also all the cabinet collegues of chief minister N Rangasamy (barring chandragasu) were defeated.Mr.Chandragasu did not contest the elections owing to health reasons and the AINRC fielded Chandrapriyanga,his daughter who won from Nedumgadu.
The opposition claimed that Mr.Rangasmay failed to act as the chief minister of the whole union territory and acted as if he is the chief minister for only one constituency.They also cited the appointment to government posts (including backdoor appointment) only to people from his constituency.To substantiate this claim,AINRC bagged the Indira Nagar(Rangasamy)Kadirgamam (NSJ Jayabal) and Thattanchavady (Ashok Anand),the constituencies carved out of Rangasamy’s Thattanchavady constituency before the trifurcation.Political observers feel that the induction of as many as 14 new faces ,denial of seats to those revolted against the party at the time of the Rajya Sabha elections and the change of constituencies to some including tourism minister P Rajavelu also contributed to the party’s debacle.
The polling percentage of the AINRC came down to 28.12 percent this time against the 31.75 percent in 2011 elections.
The number of persons who opted ‘None Of The Above’(NOTA) to exercise their franchise has also gone up considerably this time and it was 13240 votes(1.65 percent of the total votes)