Kasaragod: Votes in the Kasaragod constituency have opted to maintain the status quo giving incumbent MP Rajmohan Unnithan another term in the just concluded Lok Sabha polls, as per the Manorama News-VMR exit poll.

This has put to an end talk that Unnithan’s 2019 victory was a one-time phenomenon, with the Congress leader projected to register a huge victory margin. A huge percentage – 47.72– who took part in the survey voted for the Opposition United Democratic Front (UDF) candidate Unnithan. The ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) was the choice of 34.17 per cent of the voters who participated in the exit poll. The BJP, which considers the LS seat as its fortress, could manage 17.12 per cent votes.

As per the survey, the UDF got the maximum number of votes in the 2024 LS polls from Kasaragod, a gain of 4.55 per cent votes compared to the 2019 polls. This was also reflected in losses for the LDF, which saw an erosion of 5.33 per cent from its kitty. The BJP also saw its vote share increase by 1.12 per cent. Overall, the UDF is expected to get 13.55 per cent more votes than the LDF, the exit poll indicated.

In 2019, the UDF garnered 43.17 per cent of votes, the LDF got 39.5 per cent, and the BJP got 16 per cent of the total votes polled. Independents and others got 1.33 per cent votes.

The difference in voting percentage between UDF and LDF was 3.67 then. In 2019, in his maiden Lok Sabha contest, Unnithan trounced CPM’s K P Satheesh Chandran by a margin of 40,438 votes. Unnithan got 4,74,961 votes, the LDF candidate got 4,34, 523 and BJP’s Ravisha Tantri Kuntar bagged 1,76,049 votes last time.