ITANAGAR, Oct 24 - Independent candidate Chakat Aboh won the by-election to the Khonsa West Assembly seat in Tirap district.
Chakat Aboh, widow of slain National People�s Party (NPP) leader Tirong Aboh, defeated her lone rival and Independent candidate, Azet Homtok, by a margin of 1,887 votes, Arunachal Pradesh Deputy Chief Electoral Officer Liken Koyu said.
Aboh polled 5,705 votes, while Homtok garnered 3,818 votes, the Deputy CEO stated. Out of 144 electronically transferred postal ballots (of service voters) and postal ballots (of polling officials), Aboh got 91 votes and Homtok 33. The remaining 20 votes were rejected, he said.
Altogether 68 voters went for NOTA. With Aboh�s win, the total strength of women representatives in the 60-member Arunachal Assembly has risen to four.
The ruling BJP has 41 MLAs, Congress and NPP four each, JD(U) seven, PPA one and three Independents.
Aboh was backed by five major political parties, including the BJP and the Congress. An estimated 93.2 per cent of the 10,309 electors, including service voters, exercised their franchise in the bypoll.
The by-election to the seat was necessitated after Tirong Aboh, who contested and won the April 11 Assembly polls as the NPP nominee, was gunned down by suspected NSCN militants in Bogapani area of Tirap district on May 21, two days before the poll results were declared.
