CINTAA-the pioneer organization representing TV and film actors - has always been a flag bearer when it comes to preserving the interest of the actors. Now, the body met to choose the shoulders that will carry on the responsibilities in the coming year. 58 contestants battled it out to enter the elite executive committee. The battle of ballot was held on 1 May (2013) and thereafter, counting continued for the next two days, ending early morning today (3 May). The election was fought between two major camps, namely that of Johny Lever’s and Rakhi Sawant’s, and the other challenger was the ever popular Sahila Chadha, who went solo. “It was a hardly fought contest and finally, Johny Lever bagged the maximum number of votes. Majority of his group members emerged as winners. Rakhi and Sahila too thumped their authority in terms of popularity,” said an actor who was present at the venue. As mentioned, the Johny Lever group emerged victorious once again with majority of its existing executive members getting reelected. Amongst the reelected members are Dharmesh Tiwari, Gajender Chauhan, Arun Bali, Rajiv Verma, Raza Murad and Sudhir Pandey, while Pankaj Dheer and Shagufta Ali are the new entrants. From Sawant’s group Sushil Parashar and Gulshan Pandey came out triumphant. Sahila Chaddha also wowed everyone by bagging impressive number of votes and waving the V-for victorious sign. Here’s the list of winners (as per votes received-highest to lowest) Johny Lever-839 Rakhi Sawant-734 Sahila Chaddha-670 Dharmesh Tiwary-584 Arun Bali-579 Gulshan Pandey-552 Shahil Parashar-534 Gajender Chauhan-493 Sudheer Pandey-424 Pankaj Dheer-420 Raza Murad-381 Shagufta Ali-371 Rajiv Verma-356 The body will meet sometime next week to decide on the designations and work responsibilities of the elected contestants. ‘Most probably, Johny will again become the President whereas Rakhi Sawant might come in as the new General Secretary replacing Dharmesh Tiwari, ”said an industry source. Tellychakkar.com got in touch with Dharmesh and he said, “The election process went really well. Yes, maximum of the exiting executive committee members won, which reflects the fact that we have been doing a good job. In the coming days, our focus will be to make sure that actors get payments for their work in due time and also better working facilities are provided on the sets. There are other agendas also, which we will look into and discuss in the coming days.” We will keep you posted on further developments!!!!