Bengaluru: Chikkodi parliamentary constituency elected former Union Minister late B Shankaranad seven times till 1996 and there is an interesting story about how Shankara nand was finally defeated by Janata Parivar candidate Ratna mala Dhareshwar Savanur.
Just before the 1996 Parliament elections, Janata Dal leaders Deve Gowda and Ramakrishna Hegde sought guidance from an astrologer on how to defeat Shankara nand who told them to field a candidate whose name begins in the letter `R'. The Janata Dal fielded Ratnamala Savanur, who won and also became minister in the I.K. Gujral government.
In 1998, the Janata Parivar split and Ramesh Jigajinagi was fielded against Mrs Savanur and won the election. The ‘R' factor was back in play with Ramesh Jigajinagi winning in 1999 and again in 2004. In 2009, Jigajinagi was moved to Bijapur (now Vijaya pura) and the BJP gave the ticket to Ramesh Katti, maybe out of reverence for the `R` factor and he won!
The jinx was finally broken in 2014 when the Congress fielded Prakash Hukkeri who defeated Ramesh Katti. This time too, Ramesh Katti tried
his best to get the party ticket but failed and there is no `R' factor in the poll now. The BJP has given the ticket to Anna Saheb Jolle, a pioneer of the cooperative movement in the region.
