Kerala Assembly Elections 2026 | NDA re-opens account in Kerala assembly as BJP's Gopakumar wins from Chathanoor constituency

Thiruvananthapuram: BJP has reopened its account in Kerala with party candidate B B Gopakumar winning from Chathannoor seat in Kollam district, while party state president Rajeeev Chandrasekhar is maintaining lead at Nemom.

Gopakumar, who was runner-up in the last two assembly elections, won with 4002 votes.

Gopakumar reacted that it was the result of the dedicated work of the Sangh Parivar organisations as well as workers from the grassroot levels.

He defeated R Rajendran of the CPI and Sooraj Ravi of Congress.

BJP had won the maiden seat in Kerala assembly in 2016 with O Rajagopal winning the Nemom seat. But the party lost the seat in 2021.

Many parts of Chathannoor constituency are known as strongholds of the RSS, which gives the BJP an edge.

The saffron party's vote share drastically went up from around four percent in 2011 to 21.56 percent in 2016 pushing the Congress to the third position. In the 2021 election BJP's vote share  again increased to 30.6 percent.

The constituency that used to witness a tight fight between the Congress and CPI was being won by CPI since 2006. In 2021 BJP lost by around 17,200 votes. But considering the huge leaps in vote share, the saffron party has high hopes.