SIKKIM:
Football legend and Sikkim Democratic Front (SDF) candidate from Barfung Assembly seat Bhaichung Bhutia lost to Sikkim Krantikari Morcha’s Riksal Dorjee Bhutia by 4,346 votes, as per Election Commission data. Bhaichung Bhutia received 4,012 votes while his rival, Riksal Dorjee, bagged 8,358 votes.
Bhutia is currently the vice-president of the SDF. He merged his own Hamro Sikkim Party, formed in 2018, with the SDF in 2023.
The former captain of the Indian football team has previously contested polls on a Trinamool Congress ticket but lost on both occasions. He was fielded by the Mamata Banerjee-led party in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls from Darjeeling, and in the 2016 Assembly elections from Siliguri.
Success also eluded him when he contested the 2019 Assembly elections from Sikkim’s Gangtok and Tumen-Lingi. He also lost the 2019 bypoll in Gangtok.
The ruling Sikkim Krantikari Morcha (SKM), led by Prem Singh Tamang, secured a second straight term in the Himalayan state.
SKM won 31 of the 32 seats, while the Sikkim Democratic Front (SDF) bagged just a solitary seat. The majority mark in the Sikkim Assembly is 17 seats.
Bhaichung Bhutia has been credited for the resurrection of the Indian football team in the modern era. He was also the first Indian footballer to represent a European club.
Bhaichung Bhutia, with 48 goals for India, is the second-highest scorer for the country after Sunil Chhetri.
