With all three candidates from their own gewogs wining the majority of EVM votes, it was the gewogs without candidates that decided Trongsa’s National Council elect.

Incumbent Tharchen and Council-elect Tashi Samdrup were neck-in-neck in postal ballot votes.

Gyem Dorji who is from Dragteng gewog secured 630 votes of the 980 while Tharchen won 257 and Tashi Samdrup, 99 votes from the gewog. 

Voters shared that Tharchen stood a good chance had there been no candidates from Dragteng. 

In Korphu gewog, Gyem Dorji managed 134 EVM votes while Tashi Samdrup secured 171, the highest. While Korphu is adjacent to Langthil, from where Tharchen hails, the incumbent secured the least votes of 95. 

Tharchen won 804 votes from Langthil against Tashi Samdrup’s 107 and Gyem Dorji’s 81. Tharchen managed 81 percent of the votes in Langthil.

However, Nubi gewog, which has the highest number of voters and saw a high turnout on poll day, gave 945 votes to Tashi Samdrup, 128 to Tharchen and 91 to Gyem Dorji. Tashi Samdrup, who is from Nubi gewog secured 72 percent of the votes from Nubi.

In Tangsibji gewog, which didn’t have a candidate, 379 votes favoured Tashi Samdrup, 99 Tharchen and 60 Gyem Dorji.

In terms of postal ballot, Tharchen won the highest, 622 votes, followed closely by Tashi Samdrup at 614 and Gyem Dorji at 339.

This is the second time Tashi Samdrup contested the council elections.

While none of the candidates were present at the counting centre, Tashi Samdrup’s representative, Palden Rabten said that the elected candidate would have won in the first try.

“However, there was another influential candidate from Tangsibji and votes got divided in Nubi,” the representative said.

Dragteng is considered a strong hold of Tharchen. But this time the gewog had their own candidate and that is how the votes got divided.

Of the 10,034 registered voters, 5,658 voters voted through the EVM and postal ballot.  

Tshering Dorji | Trongsa