According to the final results of voting, Malihabadi had polled the maximum number of votes, more compared to even Left Front candidates.

This comes at a time when cracks between the Left and the Congress-led UPA government apparently widened over a number of issues, including the crucial Indo-US nuclear deal.

Following the results of Rajya Sabha elections, it will now be easier for the Opposition, including the TMC, to point out the bonhomie between the CPM and Congress, even at the state level, where these two parties apparently have a striking posture against each other.

“Is he (Malihabadi) an Independent candidate? Or a candidate from UPA-Left coordination committee? This question should be asked to CPM and Congress leaders,” said Partho Chatterjee, leader of the Opposition in the Assembly and a TMC legislator.

Another interesting feature of the vote is that the Forward Bloc had to compromise with the CPM despite a year-long rift between the two allies over issues like Nandigram and land acquisition issue.

The recent police firing in Dinhata in which five Forward Bloc supporters died widened the rift further.

The relation between the two Left allies soured to the extent that the Bloc decided to contest the Tripura Assembly elections alone. Bloc contested 15 Assembly seats in Tripura against the CPM and was routed in all.

This time, the party compromised and withdrew Barun Mukherjee, sitting MP in Rajya Sabha and paved the way for the victory of Debabrata Biswas, Bloc general secretary and one of the senior leaders in the Left coordination committee in Delhi.

At the end of the day-long voting in the state Assembly, the Left group polled 234 votes and the Congress polled 24 votes, with support from two Independent MLAs, one GNLF MLA and one JKP MLA. The SUCI voted for TMC candidate whereas the two breakaway GNLF legislators were absent. The Kharba Assembly seat was vacant since the MLA there died recently.