Congress wins in Puducherry

New Delhi, May 19: In what could only be counted as a consolation prize, the Congress prevailed in Puducherry and is set to form the government in the Union Territory. The Congress-DMK combine won 17 of the 30 seats, with the Congress alone pulling in 15. The Congress has beaten back incumbent N Rangasamy, who had broken away from the Congress to form the All India NR Congress (AINRC) just ahead of the last election. AINRC won 8 seats while the AIADMK grabbed 2. The Congress’s own vote share trumped AINRC by 2.5 percentage points. But combined with the DMK, the winning side scored 39.5 percent of the votes against AINRC’s 28.1 percent. The Congress had not med a Chief Ministerial candidate ahead of the polls, and now finds itself with two former Chief Ministers who could make a bid for the top job - V Vaithilingam and V rayasamy.  Vaithilingam does have the edge over rayasamy in that he has served as Opposition leader for the past five years, and has also been elected to the Puducherry Assembly from the Kamaraj gar constituency.  (IANS)