Women Candidates Who Made it to the 15th Assam Legislative Assembly

Guwahati: Of the 74 women candidates who had contested the recently concluded Assam Assembly elections, only six have won. They are Renupoma Rajkhowa (AGP), Ajanta Neog (BJP), Suman Haripriya (BJP), Nandita Garlosa (BJP), Sibamani Bora (Cong) and Nandita Das (Cong).

This means only 4.76% women legislators will represent 1,13,55,79 (49.30%) women voters of the state in the 126-member Assam Assembly.

Renupoma Rajkhowa of AGP retained the Teok seat. She defeated Pallabi Gogoi of Congress. Rajkhowa won 47,555 votes while Gogoi got 46,205 votes. Renupoma Rajkhowa got lucky the fourth time. She has won the Teok seat thrice earlier in 1991, 1996 and 2016. She was contesting this time for the sixth time.

Four-time MLA and former Congress minister in Tarun Gogoi government, Ajanta Neog won the Golaghat seat for the fifth time, but this time on a BJP ticket. She defeated her nearest rival Bitupan Saikia of Congress with a margin of 9,325 votes. Neog polled 81,651 votes while Saikia got 72,326 voters.

Another woman candidate who won the election from the BJP camp is Suman Haripriya. She retained the Hajo seat for a second term by defeating Dulu Ahmed of Assam Jatiya Parishad (AJP) with a margin of 14,368 votes. Haripriya polled 66,165 votes, Ahmed got 51,797 votes.

BJP's Nandita Garlosa won the Haflong seat beating Nirmal Langthasa of the Congress. This was Nandita's maiden election. She defeated Langthasa with a margin of 18,598 votes. Nandita got 67,797 votes, Langthasa won 49,199 votes.

The two Congress women candidates – Nandita Das was successful in retaining her Boko seat with a comfortable tally of 1,20,504 votes against her nearest rival Jyoti Prasad Das of AGP who got 67,985 votes.

And Sibamoni Bora defeated incumbent BJP MLA Angoorlata Deka to win the Batadroba seat. Sibamoni won 84,278 votes while the actor-turned-politician Angoorlata got 51,458 votes.