Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) candidate Anoop Jacob is leading by over 3000 votes in the bypoll to the Piravom assembly constituency where counting began on Wednesday morning.
After the end of fourth round of counting, Anoop Jacob was leading by 3153 votes.
While the CPI(M) led Left Democratic Front (LDF) candidate M J Jacob had led in the initial rounds, Anoop Jacob managed to surge ahead after that.
The counting is being held at the Nirmala Juniors school, Muvattupuzha. The constituency had witnessed a record polling of 86.3 per cent during this time.
The bypoll was necessitated following the death of former minister, T.M. Jacob, father of Anoop Jacob.
With the death of T M Jacob, the UDF strength in the 140 member Assembly had gone down to 71, while in the LDF camp, the recent resignation of Neyyatinkara MLA, Selvraj has reduced its strength to 67.
T.M. Jacob had won by a slender margin of 157 votes in 2011 assembly polls.