Sunsari, December 2

Nepali Congress’ Tilak Rai shook the red fort of the communists and won the mayoral post of Dharan Sub-metropolitan City.

Tilak Rai of the opposition Nepali Congress defeated Nepal Communist Party (NCP)’s candidate Prakash Rai with a margin of 2,795 votes and registered a historic victory in the stronghold of the communists. The NC, which has not won mayoral post after the restoration of democracy, was able to tear down the communists’ fortress.

NC’s Tilak garnered 26,609 votes while his rival Prakash Rai received 23,914 votes. A total of 54,848 votes were cast in the by-election.

Dharan has 92,853 registered voters. After bagging the mayoral seat, Tilak Rai said there was no hierarchy of ruling and opposition parties at the local level and stated that he would work in tandem with others. He pledged to collaborate with other elected representatives and work for the prosperity and development of Dharan. “I was elected by the votes of people not by the NC’s votes alone,” Rai commented, adding, “This is the victory of the people and I will work in collaboration with other parties and elected people’s representatives.”

NCP has a two-thirds majority at Dharan Sub-metropolis’ executive. The NC has mayor and five ward chairs while NCP has 24 representatives along with deputy mayor.

Tilak Rai was mayoral candidate from the NC in the last local level polls as well. He was then defeated by then CPN-UML’s Tara Subba with a margin of 4,873 votes.

Subba had garnered 20,975 votes while Rai had received 16,102 votes then.