Congress voters remained faithful & paid tribute to David Nongrum but party failed to retain bastion

Syllad | The Rising MeghalayaNovember 2, 2021

Although the Indian National Congress failed to retain its bastion but the party supporters and voters remain loyal to the Party and did their part to pay tribute to their departed leader and former MLA of Mawryngkneng Late David Nongrum.

This was evident from the numbers of voters obtained by Highlander Kharmalki who contested from the Congress after the family members of late David Nongrum decides against contesting in the bye election following sudden demise of Nongrum.

According to the verdict passed by the 28875 electorates of Mawryngkneng Assembly Constituency which went for polling on Saturday, Kharmalki clinched 12361 votes which is 42.81 percent of the total votes shares which indicated that there was no dropped in the total votes obtained by late David Nongrum in the last general Assembly Election as he got 10366 out of 27527 votes.

Presently, the majority of voters of Mawryngkneng Assembly Constituency decided to give Pyniaid Sing Syiem of the Nationalist People Party and Chairman of the Khasi Hills Autonomous District Council (KHADC) a chance to legislate and voice their grievance in the floor of the house as Syiem secured 14177 votes out of the total polled votes of 28875 which constituted 49.1 percent of the total votes share.

The remaining three independent candidates namely Arbiangkam Kharsohmat got 214 and he was outplayed by NOTA as 238 voters prefer the latter over the five candidates while former Congress leader Norbert Marboh managed to clinch only 1400 votes and Erson Marwein obtained 485 votes and all of them lost their security deposits.

Fipping again the page of history, Syiem in the last general assembly clinched 5969 votes while Kharmalki got 6573 votes and Pynehborlang obtained 3011 votes while Moses Kharbithai and Torry Teison Kharmuti secured 1037 votes and 411 votes respectively.

Ironically the numbers of voters who preferred NOTA over candidates increased from the last election as previously it was 184 but in this bye election there were 238 voters who championed NOTA.

According to political analysts, Syiem got the upper hand over his political opponents as his party was leading the coalition Government which have made several promises in the Assembly Constituency after the sudden demise of David Nongrum amongst which included up-gradation of Mawryngkneng PHC to CHC and setting up of PHC in Sohryngkham and also setting up of wholesale market in Mawryngkneng.