Tuesday, November 22 2005 13:27 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Thiruvananthapuram: Dealing yet another crushing blow to the ruling Congress-led UDF in Kerala, the Left Democratic Front (LDF) today (Nov 22, 2005) retained the Thiruvananthapuram Lok Sabha seat with Communist Party of India's (CPI) Pannyan Raveendran trouncing V S Sivakumar of the Congress by a margin of 74,027 votes.

In the keenly fought by-election, held barely six months before the assembly polls, the LDF not only kept up its winning spree that began with the 2004 Parliament elections when it blanked the Congress in the state, but also improved the victory margin this time.

The by-poll was caused by the death of CPI veteran and former Chief Minister P K Vasudevan Nair, who wrested the seat from the Congress by a margin of 54,000 votes in 2004.

The outcome was all the more stinging for the Congress as the Democratic Indira Congress (K), led by Kerala veteran K Karunakaran, proved a force to reckon with by extending unstilted support to the LDF.

The BJP, which put up a commendable show last time by securing 2.28 lakh votes, suffered a severe rout, despite the party fielding former state president C K Padmanabhan, who lost his deposit.

Raveendran, CPI sate assistant secretary and a debutant in the electoral arena, upset the UDF calculations of harnessing regional, caste and communal factors for a badly needed victory.