Daijiworld Media Network-Mangaluru (RJP)
Mangaluru, Dec 26: Elections for 20 legislative council seats will be held on Sunday, December 27 in the state. Among them, Udupi -Dakshina Kannada twin districts constituency is attracting more attention not only because it has 8 contestants in the fray, but because it has two rebel candidates from Congress. This constituency chooses two candidates as MLCs.
BJP has only one candidate contesting the election though it could have fielded two candidates. Congress too has fielded only one candidate. But with two rebels contesting, it is like three persons from Congress are contesting for the votes from its party though the election in not held on party lines. Harikrishna Bantwal and Jayaprakash Hegde, two rebel candidates were in Congress party till few days back when they were expelled for 'anti-party' activities.
BJP will have an easy win, say the BJP leaders confidently. BJP voters have been told to cast one vote while they have two votes each. But they can still cast the second votes going against the directive as the voting is secret. Congress candidates, official as well rebels, are confident of getting these second votes from the BJP voters. Hegde says he is a state level leader and hence voters from all parties will vote for him. He is confident of getting more votes from Udupi region.
Harikrishna Bantwal says that the voters from Udupi district will choose the second candidate from Dakshina Kannada and as there are many Billava voters, he has the chance of getting votes from them, being a Billava.
The contest is between four candidates, it is believed. They are Kota Srinivasa Poojary (BJP), Pratapchandra Shetty (Congress), Jayaprakash Hegde (Independent) and Harikrishna Bantwal (Independent). The other four may not get as many votes as the first four get, but share of their votes will have a direct bearing on the outcome.
The constituency has 6568 voters with 1019 from Kundapur taluk, 1156 from Udupi taluk, 539 from Karkal taluk, 1204 from Mangaluru taluk, 928 from Bantwal taluk, 704 from Beltangady taluk 657 from Puttur taluk and 361 from Sullia taluk.
Amid attacks and counter attacks by candidates till the midnight of Friday, the field is now ready for the real battle.