The NPP is fighting for 57 Assembly seats in the election. (FILE)
The National People's Party (NPP) won 19 seats in the 2018 Meghalaya Assembly election. The NPP-led Meghalaya Democratic Alliance (MDA) came to power taking support from the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) and the United Democratic Party (UDP) along with the Hill State People's Democratic Party (HSPDP) and People's Democratic Front (PDF). This time, NPP and BJP have not forged a pre-poll alliance and are contesting the elections on their own. The NPP is fighting for 57 Assembly seats and has fielded key candidates including Deputy Chief Minister Prestone Tynsong. Here are five points about him.
- Prestone Tynsong has been elected to the Meghalaya Assembly consecutively three times on a Congress ticket. He won the Lyngkyrdem (ST) seat in 2003 and 2008 and emerged victorious in the Pynursla constituency in 2013. He retained the Pynursla seat in 2018 after contesting on an NPP ticket.
- He served as Community and Rural Development Minister in the Mukul Sangma-led government and also held the PHE and Border Area Development portfolio.
- In 2017, Prestone Tynsong quit Congress to join NPP a few months ahead of the 2018 Assembly election.
- Prestone Tynsong was sworn in as a cabinet minister after the NPP-led alliance formed the government in 2018. The 57-year-old was made Meghalaya's Deputy Chief Minister and the National Vice-president of NPP.
- The NPP leader passed his Class 10 in 1983 and Class 12 in 1985. Prestone Tynsong obtained a bachelor's of commerce degree from the North-Eastern Hill University (NEHU) in 1989. For the 2023 Meghalaya Assembly polls, Prestone Tynsong is contesting once again from the Pynursla constituency.