Ananda Prasad Dhungana of the Nepali Congress and Janata Samajbadi Party’s Puja Chaudhary have been elected National Assembly members from Madhesh Province.

Dhungana garnered 7,370 votes, while Chaudhary managed to secure 7,929 votes.

The main opposition the CPN-UML had also fielded Usha Devi Tharuni and Bijeta Jha as its candidates in the province.

Ruling coalition partners Congress and Samjabadi Party jointly fought the elections.

A total of 10,839 votes were cast in Thursday’s poll. 136 chairs and deputy chairs of rural municipalities and municipalities and 106 of the 107-strong Provincial Assembly members cast their votes in the poll.

Meanwhile, Dhanusha Police detained more than 60 people, associated with the Aam Janata Party, for staging Janakpur-centric protests in an attempt to disrupt the election.

The term of 20 lawmakers in the 59-strong upper house is expiring on March 3. While 19 seats are filled through elections, one member will be nominated by the President on the Cabinet’s recommendation.

As many as 549 provincial assembly members and 1,498 chiefs and their deputies of the local units are eligible to vote in the upper house election. Their votes have a combined weightage of 57,559. A vote of the provincial assembly member carries a weightage of 53, whereas it is 19 each for the chief and deputy chiefs of the local units.