Lok Sabha Elections 2024: The Kanniyakumari Lok Sabha constituency will witness a triangular contest in the 2024 general elections. The fight will be among the candidates of Congress, AIADMK, and BJP who have fielded Vijay Vasanth, Nazerath Pasilian and Pon Radhakrishnan respectively. Congress’ Vasanth is the sitting MP from the seat who won the bypolls after the demise of his father H Vasanthakumar in August 2020. Vasanthakumar had defeated BJP’s Pon Radhakrishnan in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
Kanniyakumari has 39 Lok Sabha seats and all of them will go to polls in the first phase of voting on April 19.
Who is Pon Radhakrishnan?
Ever since the Kanniyakumari Lok Sabha seat came into existence and the elections were first held in 2009, Pon Radhakrishnan has been BJP’s candidate in the Lok Sabha polls.
He lost to DMK's J Helen Davidson in 2009 and won in the 2014 general elections defeating Congress' Vasanthakumar. However, Congress candidate Vasanthakumar beat him in the 2019 general elections. The BJP has once again entrusted Radhakrishnan to deliver the seat to the party.
The BJP has stitched several alliances in Tamil Nadu this time as part of its southern push and inducted Tamil Maanila Congress, Amma Makkal Munnetra Kazhagam (AMMK) and PMK into the NDA.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Vasanthakumar won in Kanniyakumari with 627,235 votes.
Kanniyakumari Lok Sabha seat
The Kanniyakumari Lok Sabha seat has never been a bastion of any party. The DMK and BJP have bagged it once while the Congress has won it twice (once in the Lok Sabha bypolls in 2021).
The seat is all set to witness a tripartite contest as the sitting Congress candidate looks to retain his seat while BJP’s Pon Radhakrishnan aims to regain his lost constituency, and AIADMK eyes its first victory on the seat.
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