Constituency watch: Kaliabor in Assam

.Guwahati, March 29, 2019:

As Assam braces for the ensuing Lok Sabha elections, let us take a moment to examine one of the major Upper Assam Constituencies, Kaliabor.

Kaliabor is composed of ten Assembly segments - Golaghat, Dergaon, Bokakhat, Dhing, Batadroba, Rupohihat, Samaguri, Kaliabor, Sarupathar and Khumtai.

The current sitting MP from Kaliabar is Gaurav Gogoi, former Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi’s son. Kaliabor has been traditionally a Congress fortress as Gaurav was preceded by his uncle, Dip Gogoi, who held the position for three consecutive terms.

The Congress has held the Kaliabor Constituency on all occasions except for two terms when it went to the AGP party. It may be mentioned that Bedabrata Barua was the first MP from Kaliabor Constituency as he was elected to the lower house in 1967.

One of the former AGP MPs from Kaliabor, Keshab Mahanta, is, in fact, the brother of this year’s AGP candidate Moni Madhab Mahanta, but Assam’s Finance Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma has admitted that the AGP-BJP coalition has an uphill task in Kaliabor. “It will be hard for us to win in Kaliabor as there are many Bangladesh supporters who will vote en masse for the Congress”, he alleged at a BJP campaign rally.

Voter Turnout:

The voter turnout in the last election was 980,688, of which Gaurav nabbed a total of 443,315 (38%) votes. His closest rival was the BJP’s Mrinal Kumar Saikia, who won 349,441 (29.96%) votes. The AIUDF’s Bijoy Kumar Tiru won a total of 231,295 votes (19.83%).

This year, a total of 1,731,610 (763,599 males, 731,248 females and 31 third gender) voters will cast their votes. This year, a total of 2174 polling booths will be set up.

Kaliabor Lok Sabha constituency in numbers:

Reservation nature of constituency: General

Sitting MP, Party: Gaurav Gogoi, Congress

Winning margin in 2014: 93,874 votes

Runner up name, party: Mrinal Kumar Saikia, BJP

Number of voters in 2014: 1,457,865

Percentage of votes polled in 2014: 80.01

Number of polling booths in 2014: 1772

Number of women voters: 705,080