Kummanam Rajashekharan defeated by Sashi Tharoor

Former Mizoram Governor Kummanam Rajashekharan, who contested from Thiruvananthapuram constituency was defeated atthe hands of senior Congress leader and former union minister Sashi Tharoor.

For Tharoor it was a hat-trick of wins from the prestigious constituency by over a margin of nearly a lakh votes.

A former diplomat and well known author, Tharoor managed to garner over 4.16 lakh votes whereas Rajashekharan got 3.16 lakh votes.

The Left had fielded its sitting MLA of CPI, C Divakaran, who managed only 2.5 lakh votes.

Rajasekharan had resigned as governor of the North eastern state in March to contest as the BJP's candidate in the Lok Sabha polls from Thiruvananthapuram.

The 66-year-old Rajashekharan began his career as a RSS worker in the 1970s and served aspresident of the Kerala unit of the BJP between December 2015 and May 2018 before his elevation to the gubernatorial post.

It was under Rajasekharan's leadership that the BJP opened its account in Kerala by winning the Nemom seat in the 2016 assembly polls.

Rajasekharan was made the Mizoram Governor on May 25 last in a surprise move when the crucial Chengannur Assembly bypoll was round the corner.

A section of party workers had demanded since then the return of the senior leader to active politics.

O Rajagopal, a senior BJP leader and the party's sole MLA in the state assembly, had given a tough fight to Tharoor in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls.

He had garnered 2,83,226 votes then with Tharoor winning by a margin of little over 15,000 votes.

The BJP had pinned its hopes on Thiruvananthapuram, especially in view of the Sabarimala issue over which a large number of people, including women, had come out against the LDF government's decision to implement the Supreme Court verdict, permitting women of menstrual age to offer prayers at the Lord Ayyappa shrine.