K’taka Assembly bypolls: Peaceful voting in all 15 seats, all eyes on Dec 9 counting

Bengaluru, Dec 05: The voting in all the 15 Karnataka Assembly constituencies ended at 5.24 pm on Thursday. The spotlight shifted from the recent Maharashtra political drama to Karnataka elections now, as the B S Yediyurappa-led BJP government need to win six more seats to be in power in the state.

On Thursday the total 15 constituencies concluded with the voters turn out at 60 per cent which means at least 37.78 lakh electors cast their votes till 5.24 pm.

According to the PTI report, the highest turnout was recorded was of 79.8 per cent in Chikkaballapura and the lowest was 37.5 per cent at K R Puram in Bengaluru.

The PTI report also suggested that the other two constituencies in Bengaluru too have recorded comparatively lower turnout. As Mahalakshi layout- 40.47 per cent, Shivajinagar- 41.13, officials said. Turnout in other constituencies are- Athani- 70.73 per cent, Kagwad- 69.76, Gokak- 66.64, Yellapur- 72.23, Hirekerur- 72.42, Ranebennur- 67.92, Vijayanagara- 58.93, Yeshwanthpura- 48.34, Hoskote- 76.19, K R Pete- 75.87, and Hunsur- 74.47.

This by-election is like a 'stake on thin ice', as B S Yediyurappa government has to win six more seats to remain in power.

Presently, BJP has 106 MLAs including an independent lawmaker in the 207-members Karnataka Assembly. The total strength is 224 members, but the number dropped down in July when 17 Congress and JD(S) MLAs left and joined the saffron brigade.

This brought a drastic change in government formation in this southern state. Resulting H D Kumaraswamy's coalition government to collapse. The collapse of Congress-JD (S) government in the state triggered huge drama for over a long time, and the Speaker K R Ramesh Kumar later disqualified those rebel MLAs.

The bypolls reportedly almost underwent in a peaceful manner across the state, only some incidents of ruckus were reported. Like in Hunsur arguments between workers of political parties and police, In Yeshwanthpur chaos was reported between the voters and EC officials regarding the allegations of deletion of some voter's names from the list. EVMs malfunctioning due to technical snag was reported in some places like Singayyanapalya in K R Puram and in Athani but later it was resumed.