All 11 candidates elected unopposed to Karnataka Legislative Council

Bengaluru: All 11 candidates, including Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s son Dr Yathindra Siddaramaiah and former BJP national General Secretary C T Ravi, were on Thursday declared elected unopposed to the Karnataka Legislative Council, a poll official said.

The biennial elections to 11 seats in the Upper House to be elected by Members of Legislative Assembly was scheduled to be held on June 13. Today was the last day for withdrawal of candidature.

As per the existing strength of parties in the Assembly, the Congress was in a position to win seven seats, BJP three and JD(S) one.

“No candidate withdrew their nomination till 3 pm today (the last day to withdraw). There were 11 candidates in the fray to fill 11 vacancies, so all of them are declared elected unopposed,” Election officer to this poll and Karnataka Legislative Assembly Secretary M K Vishalakshi said.

The other elected candidates are: ruling Congress’ Balkhees Banu, Minor Irrigation Minister N S Boseraju, CM’s political adviser K Govindraj, KPCC working president Vasanth Kumar, former MLC Ivan D’Souza, and party’s Kalaburagi district president Jagdev Guttedar.

Opposition Chief Whip in Council N Ravi Kumar, and party leader M G Mule were declared elected from BJP, as also JD(S)’ T N Javarayi Gowda, who lost the Assembly elections last year from Yeshwantpur segment.

In fact, Boseraju, who is also currently the Leader of the House in the Council, Govindraj, and Ravi Kumar were re-elected.

Besides the 11 candidates, Congress’ R M Asif Pasha had also filed nomination. However, his candidacy was rejected during the scrutiny on Tuesday, as his nomination did not have proposers.

The election was necessitated as the term of 11 MLCs — six from BJP, four from Congress and one from JD(S) — will end on June 17.