Bengaluru: Voters of Rajya Sabha during BJP MLA Vidhana Soudha in Bengaluru
Highlight
- BJP wins all three Rajya Sabha seats in Karnataka; Congress won one; JD(S) none
- Nirmala Sitharaman, Jaggesh, Lahar Singh Siroya of BJP; Jairam Ramesh of Congress won the election
- A total of six candidates were in the fray for the Rajya Sabha elections for four seats in the state.
Rajya Sabha electionsThe ruling BJP in Karnataka on Friday won all three Rajya Sabha seats and the Congress won only one of the two seats it fielded its candidates on. HD Deve Gowda’s Janata Dal (S) (JDS) did not get any seat.
The JD(S) had fielded a candidate despite not having enough votes, as the Congress did not accede to its request for support in the name of secularism.
After the counting of votes, election officials declared Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, actor-politician Jaggesh and outgoing BJP MLC Lahar Singh Siroya and former Congress Union minister Jairam Ramesh as the winners.
After this election, Sitharaman and Ramesh were re-elected to the Upper House of Parliament from Karnataka for consecutive terms, for which the Members of Legislative Assembly (MLAs) were voters.
There was suspense over the outcome of the election for the fourth seat, which saw a tight contest between the three political parties, as neither of them fielded candidates despite having a sufficient number of votes to win, and Thus the election was forced.
A total of six candidates were in the fray for the Rajya Sabha elections for the four seats in the state, necessitating a contest for the fourth.
The fight for the fourth seat saw a direct contest between Siroya (BJP’s third candidate), Mansoor Ali Khan (Congress’s second candidate) and D Kupendra Reddy (JDS’s lone candidate).
Elections to the four Rajya Sabha seats had become necessary as the term of the members was expiring on June 30.