Thiruvananthapuram: Rahul Mamkootathil of the Congress and U.R. Pradeep of the CPI-M, the winners of last month's Assembly by-elections, took their oaths in a modest ceremony on Wednesday at the members' lounge within the assembly building.
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, Leader of Opposition V.D. Satheesan, Ministers, legislators, as well as family members and friends of both the new legislators. The centre of attraction was veteran Congress leader and former Speaker V.M. Sudheeran. Also present was former popular youth leader of the BJP- Sandeep Warrier, who quit the BJP a week before the polls took place at Palakkad.
Pradeep represents the Chelakkara Assembly constituency in Thrissur district and was the legislator from the same constituency during 2016-21. He defeated his Congress rival and former MP Ramya Haridas by a margin of over 12,000 votes.
The victory at Chelakkara has come as a huge relief for Vijayan as he was under tremendous duress on account of a massive campaign unleashed by the Congress and the BJP in the rull. Even though Chelakkara seat was retained by the CPI-M which saw the margin of victory that Radhakrishnan had in 2021 assembly polls come down from over 39,000 votes to around 12,000 votes.
Mamkootathil, 34, the state Youth Congress president, won from the Palakkad Assembly constituency and is the ‘baby’ of the Congress-led Opposition.
Palakkad witnessed a real triangular fight with the BJP candidate finishing second and the CPI-M candidate finishing third, while Mamkootathil won with a record-breaking margin of over 18,000 votes.
These two by-elections became a necessity after state SC/ST Welfare Minister K.Radhakrishnan, who represented Chelakkara, won the Alathur Lok Sabha seat and Congress leader Shafi Parambil, who represented the Palakkad seat, won from the Vadakara Lok Sabha seat.
With inputs from IANS