A legislative assembly election was held in the

India India, officially the Republic of India ( Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the ...

n union territory of Puducherry 13 April 2011 to elect members from thirty constituencies in the non-contiguous territory. This election was meant to constitute the Thirteenth Assembly of Pondicherry.

Election Commission of India The Election Commission of India (ECI) is a constitutional body. It was established by the Constitution of India to conduct and regulate elections in the country. Article 324 of the Constitution provides that the power of superintendence, dir ...

.
Schedule for holding General Election to the Legislative Assembly of Puducherry
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Candidates

26 March 2011 marked the last day to complete nominations for the elections. 30 March 2011 was the last day for possible withdrawal of nominations. In total, 187 candidates contested the polls. In Yanam there was a total of ten candidates, the highest number in any constituency in this election. In the Indira Nagar constituency there were just two candidates, former chief minister N. Rangaswamy (who also contested the Kadirkamam constituency, this was the first time in the history of the territory that a candidate contested two different assembly constituencies) and

Indian National Congress The Indian National Congress (INC), colloquially the Congress Party but often simply the Congress, is a political party in India with widespread roots. Founded in 1885, it was the first modern nationalist movement to emerge in the British ...

candidate A.K.D. Aroumougame. The counting of the votes was scheduled for 13 May 2011.

Campaign

Amongst the contending parties, there were two major coalitions. On one side, there was an alliance backing the incumbent chief minister V. Vaithilingam, consisting of the Indian National Congress (which contested 17 seats), the

Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (; DMK) is a political party based in the state of Tamil Nadu where it is currently the ruling party having a comfortable majority without coalition support and the union territory of Puducherry where it is curre ...

(10 seats), Pattali Makkal Katchi (2 seats) and the

Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (; VCK) formerly known as the Dalit Panthers of India or the Dalit Panthers Iyyakkam (; DPI) is an Indian social movement and political party that seeks to combat caste based discrimination, active in the state ...

(1 seat). The other main bloc contesting the election was an alliance consisting of the All India N.R Congress of N. Rangaswamy (contesting 17 seats), the

All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam The All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (; AIADMK) is an Indian regional political party with great influence in the state of Tamil Nadu and the union territory of Puducherry. It is a Dravidian party founded by the former chief ...

(10 seats), the

Communist Party of India (Marxist) The Communist Party of India (Marxist) (abbreviated as CPI(M)/CPIM/CPM) is a Marxist–Leninist communist political party in India. It is the largest communist party of India in terms of membership and electoral seats and one of the na ...

(1 seat), the Communist Party of India (1 seat) and the Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam (1 seat). A third force was the

Bharatiya Janata Party The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP; ; ) is a political party in India, and one of the two major List of political parties in India, Indian political parties alongside the Indian National Congress. Since 2014, it has been the List of ruling p ...

, which did not align with any of the two big bloc and contested twenty seats on its own. There were also 78 independent candidates in the fray. Several high-profile national politicians took part in the campaigning: Sonia Gandhi (president of the Indian National Congress), Rahul Gandhi (Indian National Congress general secretary),

Pranab Mukherjee Dr. Pranab Mukherjee (11 December 193531 August 2020) was an Indian politician and statesman who served as the 13th president of India from 2012 until 2017. In a political career spanning five decades, Mukherjee was a senior leader in the Indi ...

(Indian National Congress union minister), Nitin Gadkari (BJP president), Sushma Swaraj (BJP MP), Venkaiah Naidu (former BJP president),

M. Karunanidhi Muthuvel Karunanidhi (3 June 1924 – 7 August 2018) was an Indian writer and politician who served as Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu for almost two decades over five terms between 1969 and 2011. He was popularly referred to as Kalaignar (Art ...

(DMK chief minister of

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a state in southern India. It is the tenth largest Indian state by area and the sixth largest by population. Its capital and largest city is Chennai. Tamil Nadu is the home of the Tamil people, whose Tamil languag ...

), J. Jayalalithaa (general secretary of AIADMK) and

Vijayakanth Narayanan Vijayaraj Alagarswami (born 25 August 1952), better known by his stage name Vijayakanth, is an Indian politician and former actor who has worked predominantly in Tamil cinema. He was the Leader of the Opposition in the Tamil Nadu Leg ...

(general secretary of DMDK).

Election

Over 810,000 voters were eligible to take part in the polls.

Parties and alliances

Source:

Results

Aftermath results

N. Rangasamy of AINRC who won 15 seats formed government without consulting AIADMK and was accused by Jayalalitha for betrayal of coalition. AINRC secured majority with support of an independent. However, hastiness shown in formation of government and denial to share power with pre-election alliance partner AIADMK proved costly for the AINRC in the subsequent elections in 2016.

Results by constituency

References

{{Puducherry elections Puducherry

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