Hubballi: About a dozen MLCs are going all out to woo new members of Gram Panchayats as they brace up for polls to the Legislative Council from local authority constituencies’ end of 2015.
With their term set to end in a couple of months, the MLCs including IT & BT minister S R Patil, are making sure that they win over as many newly elected members of these rural local bodies even as they retain their hold over those who were elected previously. Of the 11 MLCs elected from this region, six belong to Congress, and five to BJP. They are putting in a lot of effort to build a good rapport with GP members as it has become matter of prestige for both parties who have good support of voters in the region.
While the BJP has relied on newly elected youth members in Gram Panchayat elections, the Congress has made the most of various populist schemes launched by the state government. “The newly elected Gram Panchayat members will always have a good rapport with local MLAs. We are confident of victory in all eleven MLC seats in north Karnataka as majority of legislators belong to Congress. Therefore, winning the Council seats will not be a tough task for the party. Moreover, we are already working out strategies to strengthen the party in rural areas", said Congress MLC Nagaraj Chabbi who defeated Pradeep Shettar of BJP, and the brother of leader of Opposition in the Assembly, Jagadish Shettar, in Dharwad.
KPCC president Dr G. Parameshwar and his wife after casting their votes at Siddarthnagar in Tumakuru
Congress MLCs Srinivas Mane, Allamaprabhu Patil, Veerkumar Patil, Ghotnekar Srikanth Laxman, and BJP MLCs Basavaraj Patil Humnabad, G S Nyamagouda, Mahantesh Kavatagimath, Halappa Achar and Mruthyunjay Jinaga are among those who could contest for another term in the Council later this year.
JD(S) man held with fake ballot papers
A JD (S) worker was arrested by police for distributing fake ballot papers to voters during the second phase of polling in Gram Panchayat elections on Tuesday. Police said several bundles of fake ballot papers were seized from the JD (S) worker, a part-time employee of the state government. He was caught while distributing fake papers and asking voters to bring back original ballot papers from polling booths. He was nabbed following a complaint by some voters.
Meanwhile, officials ordered a re-poll in four booths in Holavanahalli Gram Panchayat of Koratagere taluk, Tumakuru district, following confusion over missing names of voters, change of symbols allotted for the candidates. A re-poll would be held on Wednesday. Angry villagers of Mallappanahalli in Gubbi taluk and, Siddarahalli in Madhugiri taluk resumed voting after two hours following an intervention by Mrs Anita Lakshmi, assistant commissioner of Madhugiri division in Tumakuru.
No candidate, no vote!
Though for the first time polling has been made mandatory in these gram panchayat elections, villagers of Thyagadal in Sandur taluk boycotted the poll as they could not find an eligible candidate to file nomination papers.
Thanks to the Election Commission authorities who determines the reservations, Muslim voters in Thyagadal were forced to boycott polling as they did not get a scheduled tribe candidate in the village to contest the election.
There is not a single non-Muslim community household in Thyagadal village, but the lone gram panchayat seat in the village has been reserved for scheduled tribes forcing the Muslim community to boycott the polling!
