Rajya Sabha polls: BJP wins 3 seats in Karnataka, Congress gets one, JD-S draws a blank

Bengaluru: The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won three Rajya Sabha seats from Karnataka, the Congress got one seat and the Janata Dal-Secular drew a blank in the results of the biennial elections to the upper House declared on Friday.

The second candidate put by Congress also lost the election. All three BJP candidates – Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, actor-turned-politician Jaggesh and Lehar Singh Siroya won the polls.

Congress leader Jairam Ramesh too won the polls.

Janata Dal-Secular’s Kupendra Reddy and Congress candidate Mansoor Ali Khan lost the election. Reddy got 30 votes and Khan got 26.

BJP general secretary CT Ravi said that BJP candidates got support from other parties.

“BJP’s candidate for RS elections from Karnataka – FM Nirmala Sitharaman, actor-politician Jaggesh and MLC Lehar Singh Siroya have won. They got more votes than the allotted ones, people from the other party helped us,” he said.
Sitharaman said the people of Karnataka had given her another opportunity to serve them.

“I thank the blessings that BS Yediyurappa (former CM) has always extended to me. I thank every MLA and through them, the people of Karnataka for having given me the 2nd opportunity to serve them… I thank the BJP Karnataka unit and every worker,” she said.

Jairam Ramesh said it was not his victory but of Team Congress.

“This is not my victory. It is a victory for Team Congress. Entire Congress party, PCC chief DK Shivakumar, CLP leader Siddaramaiah, Chief Whips, all MLAs, everybody voted. Not a single invalid vote,it’s really a victory for teamwork. It’s Team Congress that has won,” he said.

There were six candidates in the fray for four Rajya Sabha seats in Karnataka.