Pics: Umesh Marpalli/Silvester D'Souza/Spoorthi Ullal/Kishore Peraje
Daijiworld Media Network - Mangaluru/Udupi/Bengaluru (RJP)

Updated

Mangaluru/Udupi/Bengaluru, Dec 27: Voting for 25 legislative council seats in the state began on Sunday, December 27 at 8 am and ended at 4 pm.

The polling percentage in Dakshina Kannada constituency is as follows:

Total no of voters: 6,560
Votes polled: 6,533
Total percentage: 99.59%

Mangaluru: 99.58%
Bantwal: 99.68%
Beltangady: 99.72%
Puttur: 100%
Sullia: 100%
Kundapur: 99.71%
Udupi: 98.96%
Karkala: 99.63%

Dakshina Kannada district - 99.79%
Udupi district - 99.37%

By 10 am, the polling percentage in Udupi and Dakshina Kannada constituency stood at 17.56%.

MP Nalin Kumar Kateel cast his vote at Mangaluru City Corporation. Speaking to reporters, he expressed confidence about BJP candidate Kota Srinivas Poojary's victory.

"From past two years, Kota Srinivas Poojary has worked immensely to develop temples and brought funds for the purpose. He has also strived to provide social justice to all communities. He has brought pride to the panchayat. We are confident that our candidate will win by majority," Nalin Kumar said.

"All BJP candidates will cast only one vote, that is first priority vote to Kota Poojary," he added.

Comment on Congress, he said, "There is confusion in Congress. There are three candidates belonging to the party and their supporters are confused about whom to vote. But BJP supporters are very clear about their choice."

MLA J R Lobo, who also voted at Mangaluru City Corporation, said, "Congress supporters have voted for the official party candidate. There is discipline in the party. We are confident of winning.

"There is no confusion in the party. These things are common in a democratic setup. Due to the discipline in the Congress party, all will cast vote for the party's official candidate Pratapchandra Shetty," he said.

Meanwhile, health minister and Ullal MLA U T Khader who came to vote at Mangaluru taluk panchayat found that his name was not in the voters' list. He was then sent to Ullal panchayat where he was able to cast his vote. Similarly, district in-charge minister Ramanath Rai who came to vote at Bantwal taluk panchayat was sent to Kallige, where again he could not find his name in the voters' list. He was then sent back to Bantwal taluk panchayat where he finally voted.

In Udupi, Rajya Sabha MP Oscar Fernandes, minister Vinay Kumar Sorake and MLA Pramod Madhwaraj came together along with their supporters and cast their votes at Udupi CMC.

Speaking to reporters after casting his vote, Oscar Fernandes said, "Congress had done won well in the panchayat elections throughout the state, even though in Mangaluru and Udupi we were a little behind. This time Congress and BJP have fielded one candidate each in Dakshina Kannada constituency, so our candidate (Pratapchandra Shetty) will win without any problem."

Asked how many seats the Congress expects to win, "As per our party leaders, we will win about 20 seats. We have more than the required number of supporters needed for win."

Speaking to reporters, Vinay Sorake said, "There was false propaganda against our candidate and me. We called our party workers and clarified about these issues. There are 26 blocks in Dakshina Kannada-Udupi constituency and with the backing of 10 MLAs and their supporters, our victory is certain."

MLC candidate of BJP Kota Srinivas Poojary cast his vote at Saligrama town panchayat, while Byndoor MLA Gopal Poojary cast his vote at Kundapur taluk panchayat.

The Udupi-Dakshina Kannada twin constituency has 6,568 voters with 1019 from Kundapur taluk, 1156 from Udupi taluk, 539 from Karkala taluk, 1204 from Mangaluru taluk, 928 from Bantwal taluk, 704 from Beltangady taluk 657 from Puttur taluk and 361 from Sullia taluk. They are 8 contestants including Kota Srinivasa Poojary (BJP), Pratapchandra Shetty (Congress), Jayaprakash Hegde (Independent) and Harikrishna Bantwal (Independent).

Throughout the state, 1,07,123 voters will exercise their franchise where 21 from Congress, 20 from BJP, 18 from JD(S), 6 from other parties and 60 independent candidates are contesting the elections. Total number of candidates stands at 125.

Counting of votes will be done on December 30. Results will be announced the same evening.

The present election is held to fill the vacancies which will arise when the term of 25 MLCs ends on January 5.

In the 75 member legislative council, the BJP and JD(S) together form a majority with 30 and 11 members respectively while the ruling Congress has only 28 members. Political analysts feel that the Congress party is desperately seeking to increase its tally.

There are 6314 polling booths in the state. Though the political parties are fielding candidates, the election is not fought on party symbols. But the ballot papers will have the photographs of the candidates. For the first time in MLC elections, the voter has the choice of ticking ‘No’. But that voter cannot use preference vote choice.

30 zilla Panchayat, 176 taluk panchayats, 6081 gram panchayats, 10 city corporations, 57 city municipalities, 94 town municipalities, 43 town panchayats and 6516 members from local bodies with Rajya Sabha, Lok Sabha and legislative council and assembly members will vote in this election. Out of the 1,07,123 voters, 51890 are men, 55,232 are women and 1 is from other category.

Bidar, Kalaburagi, Vijayapura, Belagavi, Dharwad, Uttara Kannada, Raichur, Ballari, Chitradurga, Shivamogga, Dakshina Kannada, Hassan, Chikkamagaluru, Tumakuru, Mandya, Bengaluru, B’luru Rural, Kolar, Kodagu, Mysuru  are the constituencies in the present MLC elections. Out of the above,  Belagavi, Mysuru,Dharwad, Vijayapura and Dakshina Kannada are double-member constituencies, from where two members each are elected.