Ballari: Less than six months after his resounding victory , sitting Congress MP, V S Ugrappa lost to the BJP’s, Y Devendrappa by 51, 187 votes from the Ballari Lok Sabha constituency on Thursday. Mr Ugrappa had only in November 2018, won by 2,40,000 votes in the Ballari by-election, but appears to have been defeated by the 'Modi wave' in the constituency. Mr Ugrappa had defeated Ms J Shantha, sister of BJP leader, B Sriramulu in the November bypoll
Despite the fact that the once powerful Reddy brothers and their confidante, Sriramulu, are a spent force in this ore- rich district, Mr Devendrappa emerged victorious in the constituency where the Congress has six MLAs. The BJP candidate, who left the Congress to join the saffron party, is related to Mr Ramesh Jarkiholi, the disgruntled Congress MLA from Gokak, and was banking on the ‘Modi factor’ and Mr Sriramulu, to sail to victory. Though it should have been a cakewalk for the Congress to retain the constituency, recent developments in the district unit of the party appear to have worked against it.
