The bypolls to 15 Assembly segments in Karnataka has helped the Bharatiya Janata Party further consolidate its position in 13 districts of north Karnataka and it now holds close to 60% (57) of the seats out of the total 96 in the region.
With the electorate voting in favour of the Congress and the Janata Dal (Secular) defectors who contested bypolls from the BJP, the saffron party has also reached its second highest tally after 2008, when it held 59 seats here. Out of the 15 Assembly constituencies that went to byelections, seven were in the northern districts and BJP swept them all.
In the 2018 Assembly elections, the BJP won in 49 Assembly segments out of the total 96 seats in northern districts, while the Congress had managed to retain 40 seats and JD(S) won six. One seat had gone to R. Shankar of the Karnataka Pragnyavantha Janatha Party, whose disqualification was also upheld by the Supreme Court and he is now with the BJP on the promise of being made an MLC.
After Congress’s Umesh Jadhav tendered his resignation and switched sides, byelections were held to Chincholi Assembly constituency along with Kundagol where the death of former MLA C.S. Shivalli (Congress) had necessitated it. While Congress retained Kundagol, it could not do so in Chincholi and lost it to the BJP. With that, BJP had increased its tally to 50, while that of Congress was reduced to 39.
With the mass resignation of MLAs and their subsequent disqualification, the tally of Congress has been further reduced to 32 as seven of the Congress MLAs resigned and switched sides. Of these seats, elections were held to six segments and Congress has lost all.
The Election Commission is yet to announce election dates for Maski Assembly constituency, which was earlier held by Congress’s Pratapgouda Patil. Now the BJP’s tally has increased to 57 in this region, just two short of 59 it had in 2008 when BJP came to power with B.S. Yediyurappa successfully playing the “betrayal card” after the collapse of the BJP-JD(S) coalition government.
Meanwhile, the byelection has left Congress without any MLA in Haveri district. The lone MLA of Congress, B.C. Patil, managed to retain his seat in Hirekerur, while former MLA K.B. Koliwad’s dream of winning back Ranebennur was dashed by newcomer Arunkumar Guththur.
