Vellore (TN): In a nail biting finish, DMK's D M Kathir Anand on Friday won the Vellore Lok Sabha segment defeating his nearest rival, AIADMK's ally A C Shanmugam, by a narrow margin of 8,141 votes.
The result came as a setback to the AIADMK which was hoping to retain the seat and prove a point after it faced a near rout in the April Lok Sabha elections with the DMK-led alliance winning 37 of the 38 constituencies then.
The DMK candidate, son of party Treasurer Duraimurugan, bagged 4,85,340 votes and garnered a 47.3 per cent vote share as it wrested the Vellore seat from its arch rival AIADMK which had won it in 2014. Shanmugam of Puthiya Needhi Katchi, who contested on the AIADMK's Two-Leaves symbol, polled 4,77,199 votes and got 46.51 per cent share, the Election Commission announced.
Thanking the voters, DMK chief M K Stalin said the victory was "exceptional and unparallelled."
Since the election was like a bypoll, trouncing a ruling party candidate meant a "huge victory," he told reporters.
Also, the win has cemented DMK's position as the third biggest party in the Lok Sabha, he said adding his party's victory could have been "delayed," but cannot be "prevented."
He was apparently referring to the earlier cancellation of the election in Vellore in April when the rest of the 38 seats in Tamil Nadu went for polls. The EC had then cancelled the poll in Vellore following seizure of huge cash. The election was subsequently held on August 5 and the counting of votes was taken up on Friday morning.
The lead kept changing in initial rounds but the DMK candidate later narrowed the gap steadily and then forged ahead, holding on to the little over 8,000 vote difference till the end. Reflecting the sea-saw battle, the AIADMK cadres brimmed with enthusiasm initially but once the trend changed it was the turn of DMK workers to break into celebrations here and at the party headquarters Anna Arivalayam in Chennai.
Distribution of sweets, bursting of crackers and dancing marked the DMK's victory here and in other parts of Tamil Nadu.