Picture : ANI / X
The ruling Congress in Karnataka won three seats and the Bharatiya Janata Party one in the Rajya Sabha elections in Karnataka. Those who were elected to the Upper House are Ajay Maken, GC Chandrasekhar and Syed Naseer Hussain, all belonging to the Congress, and Narayansa K Bhandage of the BJP.
Karnataka Deputy CM D.K. Shivakumar told ANI , “This shows the unity and integrity of Congress. I thank all the MLAs, party workers and the media. I’m very happy to inform you that all Congress candidates have won. I thank all voters, CM and party workers and the AICC President also. I would like to thank Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Mallikarjun Kharge.”
All three Congress candidates Ajay Maken, Dr Syed Naseer Hussain and GC Chandrashekhar win with 47, 46 and 46 votes respectively.
Congress MP Randeep Singh Surjewala addressing the media quoted by ANI said , “This is a decisive victory for INDIA. This is a decisive defeat of those who want to corrupt the democratic process through the sale and purchase of legislators… This victory of principles, ideals, morality and numbers.”
Five candidates were in the fray for the four seats in the elections, including Janata Dal-Secular contestant D Kupendra Reddy.
The elections were marred by cross-voting.
While one of the BJP MLAs, S T Somashekar, voted for the Congress’s Maken, the other, A Shivaram Hebbar, abstained.
