Bengaluru: Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has suffered a huge setback after party high command cleared the name of CK Abdul Rehman Sharif, grandson of former railway minister CK Jaffer Sharif for the by-elections of the Hebbal Assembly constituency.
The high command has denied ticket to an outsider – MLC Byrathi Suresh, who is not yet a Congress member but is close confidant of Chief minister Siddaramaiah.
Hebbala, is one of the Assembly seats in Bengaluru city, the by-poll elections of which are going to be held on February 13. The seat was earlier held by the BJP. The MLA who held the seat died last November.
Congress in charge of Karnataka Digvijaya Singh had fully backed Siddaramaiah’s move to nominate Suresh as the candidate for the by election to the Hebbal Assembly constituency, however, this was opposed by top leaders of the party including M Mallikarjuna Kharge, BK Hariprasad and CK Jaffer Sharief.
Rehman had lost the 2013 Assembly election from the same seat. However, Jaffer Sharief put enormous pressure on the Congress president Sonia Gandhi, and finally managed to secure the ticket for his grandson on Tuesday night.
Gandhi has approved the candidature of Rahim Khan for Bidar and V. Rajashekhar Naik for Deodurg. Naik is the son of A. Venkatesh Naik, the then Deodurg MLA who died in a train accident last November.
