BJP bags 3 legislative council seats

Bangalore, Nov 3: Counting its electoral success, ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) bagged all the three Legislative Council seats from local bodies, for which byelections were held on October 31 and counting taken up on Monday, Nov 3. BJP sweeped Kodagu, Belgaum and Dharwad Council seats which had fell vacant after Arun Machaiah, Satish Jarakiholi and Basavaraj Bommai, respectively, had resigned to their seats to contest in the Assembly elections.

A joint fight by the Congress and Janatadal(S) did not have any effect on the BJP's prospects as the three candidates won as expected with comfortable margins. JD(S) had extended its support in all the three seats to the Congress by not fielding its candidates.

Reacting to BJP's success, Panchayat Raj Minister Shobha Karandlaje said the victory was an endorsement by the people of the BJP's rule, which was based on welfare and development. "People have appreciated the BJP rule during the last six months and today's win is a testimony to this. They have recognised the good governance given by the BJP and several welfare measures that it has taken up," she said In Belgaum, BJP's Shashikant Akkappa Naik defeated S C Malgi of Congress by 1418 votes. Naik got 4950 votes while Malgi could get only 3540. As many as 555 votes were invalid.
In Dharwad Shivraj Sajjan of BJP defeated Srinivasa Mane of the Congress by 72 votes, Sajjan got 3812 while Mane ended with 3157 votes. 72 votes were invalid. S G Medappa of the BJP emerged victorious in Kodagu by scoring a comfortable 173-vote over Mittu Chengappa of Congress. While Medappa took 751 votes Chengappa got 578. Independent candidate S.P.Mahadevappa received only 11 votes. 45 votes was invalid. Talking to reporters Medappa said that his first priority would be to get more grants for taluk panchayaths, ZPs and Gram Panchayaths.

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