Chennai, Feb 16 (IANS): Tamil Nadu's ruling AIADMK Monday retained the Srirangam assembly constituency in the bye-election with a huge margin over archrival DMK.
AIADMK candidate S.Valarmathi polled 151,561 votes while DMK's N.Anand secured 55,045.
Valarmathi was in a comfortable lead right from the beginning as counting began this morning.
The assembly seat was earlier held by former chief minister J.Jayalalithaa and the bye-election was necessitated following her disqualification after her conviction in a corruption case and sentence of four years in jail.
In a statement issued here, Jayalalithaa thanked the voters of Srirangam for electing her party's candidate.