The ruling Biju Janata Dal candidate Ranendra Pratap Swain on Wednesday defeated his nearest Congress candidate Suresh Chandra Mohapatra by 47,390 votes in the by-election for Athgarh assembly seat in Odisha.
While Swain, a former state minister, polled 87,604 votes, Mohapatra, who is the Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee general secretary, garnered 40,214 votes, an official in the chief electoral officer's office in Bhubaneswar said.
Bharatiya Janata Party's Bikram Dash got 2,377 votes in the seven-corner contest at Athgarh where voting was held on March 18.
The victory of Swain, a four-time MLA, came as a boost to the BJD leadership and Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik.
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