TMC's Deepak Adhikari To Face Hiranmay Chattopadhyay in Ghatal (Image: X/@idevadhikari)
Trinamool Congress MP and actor Deepak Adhikari, popularly known as Dev, is going to contest for 18th Lok Sabha elections from Ghatal on TMC ticket
Dev contested the Ghatal Lok Sabha seat in 2014 and won the seat in 2019 again. In the past, Adhikari reportedly had contentions with the party leadership. He recently resigned from three state government committees including Birsingha Development Authority, Rogi Kalyan Samity – Ghatal SD Hospital, and Ghatal Rabindra Satabarshiki Maha Vidyalaya. Moreover, on the last day of his tenure in Lok Sabha, he wrote, “My last day in Parliament,” which caused a stir about his next candidature for the upcoming elections.
Dev made his Tollywood debut on the silver screen with Agnishapath in 2006. He is known to be one of the highest-paid and sought-after Bengali actors, who received many awards and recognitions for his acting career. His popularity led him to win the 2014 general elections with over 50% of the votes. Though his acting career has received 100 percent attention his tenure in the Lok Sabha registered only around 11 percent attendance where he participated in only 1-1 debates and asked 3-102 questions respectively during 2014 and 2019. Dev was caught in controversy in 2022 in an alleged cattle smuggling case.
In Paschim Medinipur’s Ghatal seat, the BJP has decided to bank on the popularity of Hiranmay Chattopadhyay (Hiranmoy Chatterjee). Earlier a word of war sparked between Dipak Adhikari and Hiran When he targeted Trinamool MPs on cow smuggling and the Katmani issue.
Ghatal has 6 assembly segments in Medinipur district. However, the constituency is represented by the TMC candidate but in the last general elections, BJP registered a whopping increase of 34.04 percent votes. It is a SC category seat with 27.82 percent SCs, 2.13 percent STs, and 7.5 percent Muslim population. In the last general elections, the voter turnout was 80.11 percent. Here 94.03 % population is rural and the remaining is urban as per the 2011 census.
