Tripura polls 2018: CPI (M) candidate Ramendra Narayan Debbarma, sitting MLA, dies a week before elections

Source: Facebook/CPIM, Bishalgarh Sub-Divisional Committee

AGARTALA: With a week to go for Tripura Assembly elections 2018, CPI(M) candidate Ramendra Narayan Debbarma died of a cerebral stroke on February 11, 2018. 

The 68-year-old candidate, a sitting MLA, was contesting from Charilam Assembly constituency. 

"The sitting MLA and Communist Party of India-Marxist candidate for Charilam (Scheduled Tribe) seat, Ramendra Narayan Debbarma, died at the Gobinda Ballav Panth Medical College and Hospital, where he was admitted in the afternoon with chest pain," an Election Department official said. 

Addressing media persons, party state secretary Bijan Dhar said that the candidate was fit to contest elections. He further expressed grief and shock over Dhar's untimely death.

According to Santosh Biswas, a CPI(M) member of the Sipahijala district committee, Debbarma was campaigning in his constituency on Sunday morning when he felt pain and was rushed to Bishalgarh hospital near his constituency.

The doctors referred him to Gobinda Ballav Panth hospital where he died during the check-up.

According to the election commission, the official said the election in Charilam would be countermanded as per electoral laws. There are five candidates, including Debbarma, in the fray.

The polls for the 60-seat Tripura Assembly will be held on February 18, while counting of votes will be on March 3.

Debbarma, 68, after his retirement from government service in 2012, had contested the 2013 assembly polls from Charilam in western Tripura and won. The CPI-M offered him a ticket for 2018 polls.

Debbarma is survived by wife and son.

With agency inputs