In 2014 Lok Sabha polls, the UDF candidate Jose K Mani, belonging to KC (M), had secured a lead of 16452 votes in the Kottayam assembly segment. The sitting Congress MLA of Kottayam Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan has been fielded by the UDF to contest the seat in 2016 assembly polls. CPI(M)’s Regi Zacharia is the Left Democratic Front (LDF) nominee. A lawyer by profession, Regi Zacharia had unsuccessfully contested against Oommen Chandy from the Puthuppally assembly constituency earlier.
| Name of the Candidate | Party Name | Results |
| Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan | INC | Won 73894 |
| Adv. Reji Sakhariya | CPM | 40262 |
| Adv. M S Karunakaran | BJP | 12582 |
| Adv. P K Geetha Krishnan | BSP | 651 |
| NOTA | NOTA | 483 |
| Roy Chemmanam | SP | 403 |
| Rejitha Jayaram | SUCI(C) | 182 |
| John Joy | IND | 88 |
| Payas C P | IND | 58 |
Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan is the Congress sitting MLA of Kottayam which he wrested from the LDF by defeating its then sitting legislator V.N. Vasavan of the CPI(M) by a razor thin margin of just 711 votes in the last assembly elections in 2011. In that election, while Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan had polled 53825 votes, V.N. Vasavan secured 53114 votes and was followed by BJP’s Narayanan Namboothiri who got 5449 votes.
V N Vasavan was elected from the Kottayam assembly constituency in 2006.
Kottayam is one of the seven assembly constituencies which combine to create the Lok Sabha constituency of the same name in the state of Kerala. Pala, Ettumanoor, Puthuppally, Kaduthuruthy, Vaikom and Piravom are the other six assembly constituencies within the Kottayam parliamentary constituency.
In the last assembly election to Kottayam constituency, the total number of electors was 148225. Of them, 72505 were males and the rest comprised of females whose number stood at 75720.
The predominantly urban constituency of Kottayam is composed of Kottayam municipality and the gram panchayats of Vijayapuram and Panachikkad. The constituency has a large population of Nair and Christian communities.