Party secretary-general M Asojan replaced him while the other incumbent, T Murugiah, managed to retain his post in a contest that saw a close battle but with Mohan way ahead of the pack.

Sivaraajh was the MIC Youth chief during the 2015-2018 term.

The other two contenders who failed to make the cut for VP posts for the 2021-2024 term were MIC executive secretary AK Ramalingam and information chief V Gunalan.

The results for the three posts, 24 central working committee seats and 10 state committee members for each state will be officially announced by the party leadership at noon today.

The counting in the respective divisions was monitored by scrutineers from other divisions to ensure there was no bias. It ended in the wee hours of this morning.

When contacted, Mohan said this only appears to be an unofficial result and he would rather wait for the official results before celebrating.

“Whatever the outcome, it is not going to be a bed of roses for the current leadership as the real challenge will be winning back the confidence of the Indian community and getting ready for the next general election (GE15).

“There is not going to be a situation of winners take all in the MIC. We have to join forces and steer the party to greater heights. Everyone has an important role to play. Work starts for the winners today,” he told FMT.

There were six candidates in the race for the three vice-presidential posts, 60 vying for the 21 central working committee (CWC) seats, and 10 for the committee members’ posts for each state.

Although an estimated 24,000 delegates from 4,000 branches were eligible to vote, only about 70% had actually cast their ballots in the voting from 4-7 pm yesterday, the sources said.