WB Elections: In Black & White, see Suvendu & Mamata's Nandigram poll vote-counting sheet

The highly sought-after constituency of Nandigram turned out to be the biggest cliffhanger keeping people on the edge of their seats until the very last minute. After an initial slip-up by agency sources, the Election Commission finally declared BJP's Suvendu Adhikari as the winner in a neck-to-neck contest which reduced to a gap of just 6 votes at one point of time. Ultimately, Mamata Banerjee's once protege trumped over her by a margin of 1,737 votes.

Losing Nandigram,however, did not sit well with Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee who otherwise witnessed a landslide sweep in West Bengal crossing a double ton. Shortly after the announcement, a three-member Trinamool Congress delegation met with the Chief Electoral Officer at EC Office in Kolkata seeking a recount of votes.

Even as the CM threatens to move Supreme Court demanding a recounting of votes in the constituency, here is the official vote count sheet put out by the Election Commission which shows Suvendu Adhikari emerging as a clear winner after the 17 rounds of rigorous counting.

The Nandigram battle

In the run-up to the vigorously contested West Bengal polls, Nandigram became the axis of BJP's campaigning. For CM Mamata Banerjee, this became personal since it was not only her once protege facing her, but Nandigram was also the cradle of the anti-land acquisition movement that catapulted her to power in 2011. In a big decision, the TMC supremo also decided to forgo her Bhowanipore seat, announcing that she will contest only from Nandigram.

Mamata's history with Nandigram however, goes even further back to the 1980s. The TMC supremo had first etched her name in politics after defeating late Somnath Chatterjee from Congress’ ticket in Nandigram in the Lok Sabha elections. However, in the subsequent years to the land acquisition movement, which drove the Tata Nano factory out of the state, she eventually chose Bhowanipore as her fort and left Nandigram to the Adhikaris, only to meet him in the battleground in 2021. 

As per the latest EC trends, TMC is winning 69 seats and leading on 147, while the BJP has won 16 and leading on 58, which is a significant rise as compared to the 2016 election tally of 3 seats but not quite enough for the saffron party to form the government in the state this year.