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BJP takes huge victory in RR Nagar, opens account in Sira; DKShi shocked

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Bengaluru: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won both the Sira and Raja Rajeshwari Assembly by-polls on Tuesday, raising a lot of eyebrows as the Sira constituency has for decades voted either the JD(S) or Congress to power.

BJP candidate Munirathna Naidu won the bye-elections in the Raja Rajeshwari Nagar constituency with a huge margin of 57,936 votes against his opponent, Congress candidate Kusuma H, wife of deceased IAS officer DK Ravi. JD(S) candidate Krishnamurthy V received a negligible amount of votes.

Despite her loss, Kusuma has managed to wade into Munirathna’s stronghold, making the Congress optimistic about her chances of victory in the next Assembly polls.

Speaking to the media after his victory, Muniratna promised not to break the people’s trust and develop the constituency. “Our government is in power now and I will work 24×7 for the development of this segment. I will even go beyond my capacity to repay the voters,” he said.

The BJP saw its first victory in the Sira constituency with party candidate Dr Rajesh Gowda coming out on top with 74,522 votes, while Congress candidate T B Jayachandra secured 61,573 votes and JD(S) candidate Anjamma B, wife of the late JD(S) MLA B Satyanarayana secured 35,982 votes.

Dr Rajesh Gowda is a radiologist and a close friend of Congress leader and former chief minister Siddramaiah’s son Yathindra. Additionally, his father CP Mudalagiriyappa, an octogenarian, was also a Congress parliamentarian from the Chitradurga Lok Sabha constituency. He contested on the BJP ticket as Siddaramaiah turned him down in order to field two-time MLA from Sira, and his close friend, TB Jayachandra, even though the Congress high command was in favour of Rajesh Gowda as their candidate.

After the party’s defeat in both the by-polls, Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee D K Shivakumar addressed a press meet, where he expressed shock at the results.

Speaking to the media, DKShi admitted that though he had expected a defeat in RR Nagar, he had not expected to lose by such a huge margin. “I had expected a close fight with a difference of 15,000 votes in RR Nagar,” he said, adding that they had fielded Kusuma while keeping the calculations in mind.

The Sira results, however, have shocked the party’s leaders, Shivakumar said, especially because this is the first time that the BJP won in the segment. The Congress leader informed that they strongly believed that they would win in Sira. “We are shocked that the BJP won. We will see what went wrong to make sure that our party can regain the confidence of the voters in the segment,” he said.

Stating that he does not want to lay blame on anyone for the losses, Shivakumar said that he would accept defeat graciously and added that the party leaders would get together and identify the mistakes made during the campaign and discuss ways to strengthen the party.

“The Congress party is considering fielding fresh faces and we’re looking to field educated candidates. We will also field fresh faces in the upcoming elections,” he said, reiterating his belief that they chose the best candidate for the RR Nagar by-elections.

He then resolved to continue to showcase the inconsistencies in the ruling BJP’s administration and prepare for the 2023 Assembly elections. “The ruling government misused its power by distributing money, and doing other things. That is secondary, however. We still lost and the people did not give us as many votes as we expected,” he said.

He then urged the party workers not to be discouraged by the defeat.

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