The 2016 Kerala Legislative Assembly election was held on 16 May 2016 to elect 140 MLAs to the 14th Kerala Legislative Assembly. Voter turnout was 77.53%, up from 75.12% in the previous election. The result was declared on 19 May 2016. The Left Democratic Front (LDF), led by Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI(M)), won the election, defeating the incumbent United Democratic Front (UDF), led by the Indian National Congress (INC), which could only win 47 seats in the election. Pinarayi Vijayan was sworn in as the Chief Minister on 25 May.
The tenure of the members of the Legislative Assembly in the state was to end on 31 May 2016. As per the voters list published on 14 January 2016, there were around 2.60 crore (26 million) eligible voters including 6.18 lakh (618,000) new voters in the age group 18âÂÂ21. Elections to the 140-member assembly were held in 21,498 polling stations set up at 12,038 locations. There were 500 model polling stations. Systematic Voters' Education and Electoral Participation (SVEEP) programme was undertaken in Kerala to raise voter awareness.
2,065 Voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPAT) units were used by the Election Commission in 1,650 polling stations in 12 constituencies. VVPAT were not used in Idukki, Pathanamthitta, Wayanad and Kasaragod districts. The Election Commission launched several mobile apps.
There are two major political coalitions in Kerala. The Left Democratic Front (LDF) is the coalition of the left-wing and far-left parties, led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI(M)). The United Democratic Front (UDF) is the coalition of centrist and centre-left parties led by the Indian National Congress.
Voting took place on 16 May 2016 in all 140 Legislative Assembly Constituencies. The final turnout was 77.35%.
The Left Democratic Front won in a landslide in terms of seats, winning 91 out of 140 seats in the legislature. The incumbent UDF front was defeated and was reduced to 47 seats. The NDA, and independent P. C. George won one seat each.
P.C. George, who contested as an independent candidate from Poonjar, joined the NDA on a later date.
<section begin="Results" /> |- ! colspan="2" rowspan="2" | Parties and coalitions ! colspan="2" | Popular vote ! colspan="2" | Seats |- ! Votes ! % ! Candidates ! Won |- | bgcolor=| | Communist Party of India (Marxist) | 5,365,472 | 26.7 | 84 | 59 |- | bgcolor=#00BFFF | | Indian National Congress | 4,794,793 | 23.8 | 87 | 21 |- | bgcolor=#FF9933 | | Bharatiya Janata Party | 2,129,726 | 10.6 | 98 | 1 |- | bgcolor=| | Communist Party of India | 1,643,878 | 8.2 | 25 | 19 |- | bgcolor=| | Indian Union Muslim League | 1,496,864 | 7.4 | 23 | 18 |- | bgcolor=| | Kerala Congress (Mani) | 807,718 | 4.0 | 15 | 5 |- | bgcolor=| | Bharath Dharma Jana Sena | 795,797 | 4.0 | 36 | 0 |- | bgcolor=| | Independents<br />(LDF) | 487,510 | 2.4 | 8 | 4 |- | bgcolor=| | Janata Dal (United) | 296,585 | 1.5 | 7 | 0 |- | bgcolor=| | Janata Dal (Secular) | 293,274 | 1.5 | 5 | 3 |- | bgcolor=| | Nationalist Congress Party | 237,408 | 1.2 | 4 | 2 |- | bgcolor=| | Independents (IND) | 220,797 | 1.1 | 420 | 1 |- | bgcolor=| | Revolutionary Socialist Party | 216,071 | 1.1 | 5 | 0 |- | bgcolor=| | Kerala Congress (Democratic) | 157,584 | 0.78 | 4 | 0 |- | bgcolor=| | National Secular Conference | 130,843 | 0.65 | 2 | 1 |- | bgcolor=| | Revolutionary Socialist Party (Leninist) | 75,725 | 0.38 | 1 | 1 |- | bgcolor=| | Kerala Congress (Balakrishna Pillai) | 74,429 | 0.37 | 1 | 1 |- | bgcolor=| | Kerala Congress (Jacob) | 73,770 | 0.37 | 1 | 1 |- | bgcolor=| | Communist Marxist Party (Aravindakshan) | 64,666 | 0.32 | 1 | 1 |- | bgcolor=| | Congress (Secular) | 54,347 | 0.27 | 1 | 1 |- | colspan="2" | Total | 20,232,718||100.00||1,203||140 |- ! colspan="9" | |- | style="text-align:left;" colspan="2" | Valid votes | align="right" | 20,232,718 | align="right" | 99.97 | colspan="4" rowspan="5" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"| |- | style="text-align:left;" colspan="2" | Invalid votes | align="right" | 6,107 | align="right" | 0.03 |- | style="text-align:left;" colspan="2" | Votes cast / turnout | align="right" | 20,238,825 | align="right" | 77.53 |- | style="text-align:left;" colspan="2" | Abstentions | align="right" | 5,866,244 | align="right" | 22.47 |- | style="text-align:left;" colspan="2" | Registered voters | align="right" | 26,105,069 | colspan="1" style="background-color:#E9E9E9"| <section end="Results" />
Notable performances of other candidates
01.P.C.George won from Poonjar Constituency with a margion 27821 votes
No by-election is conducted for Kuttanad and Chavara
Assembly seat sharing post â bye election results: