Mr Ashwin Tanna, MRPharmS, has lost the £10,000 deposit he had to pay for his candidacy in the election of a mayor for London.
In order to retain the deposit, Mr Tanna would have needed to have polled 5 per cent of the vote. He achieved 9,015 first preference votes (0.5 per cent) and 41,766 second preference votes (2.9 per cent). This placed Mr Tanna in 10th place in the 11-candidate contest.
Mr Tanna told The Journal on May 8 that he did not believe that the candidates had been treated equally by the media during the election campaign. The only candidates that had been allowed by the BBC to make election broadcasts had been Mr Ken Livingstone (independent), Mr Stephen Norris (Con), Mr Frank Dobson (Lab) and Mrs Susan Kramer (Lib Dem). The same four candidates had been allowed to speak for longer than the other seven at a hustings event.
"There was no genuine coverage for any candidate except the main four," Mr Tanna said. "Had I known that I would not have gone in for the election."
He added that his treatment at the hands of his local press had been "marvellous", in contrast to that of the national media.
Nevertheless, Mr Tanna said that he was glad that he had stood as a real independent.