The AIADMK won in eight of the 10 Assembly constituencies in Tiruvallur district, one more than what it had won in 2011.
K. Pandia Rajan of AIADMK won from Avadi, defeating S.M. Nasar of DMK 1,395 votes.
Gaining ground
Mr. Nasar, a former two-time chairman of Avadi Municipality, was leading initially but eventually lost to Mr. Pandia Rajan.
Of the 10 Assembly constituencies — Gummuidipoondi, Ponneri, Tiruttani, Tiruvallur, Poonamallee, Avadi, Maduravoyal, Ambattur, Madhavaram and Tiruvottiyur — with a total of 31.93 lakh voters, AIADMK lost in Tiruvottiyur and Tiruvallur.
K.P.P. Samy, former DMK minister defeated AIADMK’s B. Balraj, while V.G. Rajendran defeated A. Baskaran in Tiruvallur.
At 8 a.m., postal votes of all constituencies were counted.
Initially, DMK candidates were leading in most of the constituencies with a margin of around 100 votes.
Constituencies like Avadi, Madhavaram and Tiruvallur gave a big lead for DMK in postal votes.
EVMs’ tally
An-hour-and-a-half later, votes registered in EVMs were counted for each constituency.
From the start, AIADMK candidates were in the lead in seven of the 10 constituencies except Avadi, Tiruvallur and Madhavaram with at least 500 votes margin.
After a three-tier check at the counting centre — Sriram Engineering College in Perumalpet — cone speakers were installed at various points in and outside the college premises for announcement of results.
“During the previous Assembly election, there were more centres, but this year, we had arranged for only one,” said an election official.
Of the 10 Assembly constituencies AIADMK lost only in Tiruvottiyur and Tiruvallur