As the results of the elections to rural local bodies in nine districts of Tamil Nadu began to trickle in, one result of a bye-election held in a village panchayat in Coimbatore district caught everyone’s attention.
The reason for the sudden attention was that one candidate, Karthik, scored just one vote in the bye-elections to the 9th ward in Kurudampalayam village panchayat in Coimbatore district. Since Karthik is the Vice-President of the Coimbatore (North) unit of BJP’s youth wing, Tamil Twitter was swamped with the hashtag #OneVoteBJP and #SingleVoteBJP for the whole of Tuesday.
Karthik was allotted a car symbol as candidates contesting for the posts of village panchayat president and panchayat ward members are not given party symbols.
The results of the bye-elections were shared widely on social media with people making fun of Karthik and the BJP wondering why even his family members did not repose trust in him. Twitter handles promoted bye the ruling DMK helped trend the hashtags against the BJP and Karthik which were at one point secured the no. 1 position in India.
As he became a ‘star’ instantly, Karthik released a video saying he contested the bye-election “just like that.”
“I and my family members reside in ward no. 4 of the Kurudampalayam panchayat but since the bye-election was held in ward no. 9, I thought of contesting. I consider getting one vote itself as an achievement because I did not campaign here due to family issues,” he said.
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Published 12 October 2021, 14:38 IST