Assembly results 2018: Amid the TRS cyclone in Telangana, a Left party won a seat

Hyderabad, Dec 12: The ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) won its second consecutive mandate in Telangana by increasing its tally of 2014 Assembly elections by another 25 seats, blowing away the Opposition forces. The election was brought ahead by a few months by Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao and it proved to be a masterstroke.

However, amid the TRS cyclone, a Left party succeeded in winning a seat and it was All India Forward Bloc (AIFB) and the winning candidate is Korukanti Chander Patel who won from Ramagundam constituency in Karimnagar district of the state. A rebel candidate, Patel defeated TRS's Somarapu Satyanarayana, to whom he had lost the 2014 Assembly polls, by a margin of over 26,000 votes. Patel polled over 61,000 votes in a constituency which saw 16 contestants and the BJP finished a poor sixth in the table with 1,553 votes. The Congress finished third with over 27,000 votes.

This constituency was in the headlines in the run-up to the November 28 polling as the TRS's allocation of ticket to Satyanarayana led to dissent among other party members. Patel had also dissented after getting overlooked for a TRS ticket in 2014.

The AIFB is the only Left party to win a seat in the state compared to two won by the CPI and CPI(M) in 2014. The Ramagundam constituency had another Left candidate in the form of Burra Thirupathi from the CPI(M).

The TRS won 88 seats out of 119 in the election while the Opposition alliance comprising the Congress and Telugu Desam Party won only 21. The AIMIM won seven seats while the BJP won one seat.