Even after several rounds of talks among Congress leaders and legislators, the party has not been able to reach a consensus on the candidate for Ballari (ST) Lok Sabha constituency.
Congress has almost decided to field former Minister Kimmane Ratnakar from Shivamogga Lok Sabha constituency and finalised the candidature of Anand Nyamagouda, son of Siddu Bhimappa Nyamagouda, for Jamkhandi Assembly constituency.
However, for Ballari, owing to lack of consensus in the party, senior leaders have assigned the task of selecting the candidate to D.K. Shivakumar, who is in charge of Ballari district. The meeting too shifted from the party office to Mr. Shivakumar’s residence in the evening.
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J.N. Ganesh, Kampli MLA; E. Thukaram, Sandur MLA, and P.T. Parameshwara, Hoovinahadagali MLA, did not attend the meeting.
Meanwhile, names of B. Prasad, brother of B. Nagendra, Ballari (ST) MLA, who is an accused in illegal mining and clamouring to get ministerial berth; Nagamani from Kudligi (who was denied ticket to contest in the 2018 Assembly elections); Saraswati, wife of former MLC K.S.L. Swamy; retired IPS officer Shivaprasad, and Y. Natkallappa, former ZP vice-president, are doing the rounds for the Ballari seat. All the five are new faces. In 2014, B. Sriramulu of the BJP won the election by defeating N.Y. Hanumanthappa of the Congress.
The party has unanimously decided to field Mr. Anand Nyamagouda from Jamkhandi constituency in Bagalkot district.
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Siddu Bhimappa Nyamagouda, who died in a road accident, won the 2018 Assembly elections against BJP’s Kulkarni Shrikant Subrao by a slender margin of 2,795 votes. Mr. Anand will file his nomination papers on October 16.