Karnataka Election Results 2024 Highlights: BJP continues 2019 dominance with 17 seats, Congress wins 9 in solid performance

With the NDA poised to form the government for a third consecutive time, bagging at least 290 seats, Prime Minister Narendra Modi called it a “historic feat”.

“People have placed their faith in NDA, for a third consecutive time! This is a historical feat in India’s history. I bow to the Janata Janardan for this affection and assure them that we will continue the good work done in the last decade to keep fulfilling the aspirations of people,” he wrote.

Express Photo by Tashi Tobgyal

BJP leader C N Manjunath beat Congress heavyweight and sitting MP D K Suresh to secure Bangalore Rural, in one of the most watched contests in Karnataka.

A renowned cardiologist and the son-in-law of former prime minister H D Deve Gowda, Manjunath, fighting his first election, beat Suresh, the brother of Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar, by over 2 lakh votes.

For the BJP-JD(S) alliance, the victory is significant — Bangalore Rural has been considered the dominion of the DK brothers for over a decade. While Shivakumar has represented Kanakapura, one of the eight Assembly seats that comes under the Bangalore Rural parliamentary seat, since 2008, Suresh had been elected from the Lok Sabha seat thrice since 2013. Read more

P.C Mohan took to X, "Thank you, Bangalore Central. The faith you have placed in me is humbling and strengthens my resolve to work even harder to fulfill people’s aspirations. I salute the hard work of our Karyakartas, who are the true strength of our party. It was, indeed, a classic RCB-style finish."

P.C Mohan rose to victory with 6.5 lakh votes defeating Mansoor Ali Khan by a margin of 32,707 votes. 

Former Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda took to X and said, "I congratulate my friend @ncbn on his great victory. He will without doubt serve the people of Andhra Pradesh with great dedication. His victory reminded me of 1996 when I formed the government."

With the BJP likely to fall behind the majority mark, the formation of a new Narendra Modi government will now depend on the support of two veteran kingmakers — the Telugu Desam Party or TDP’s Chandrababu Naidu and Janata Dal (United) or JD(U)’s Nitish Kumar, both partners of the BJP in the NDA.

Express Photos by Jithendra M.

Belgaum - Jagadish Shettar (BJP)

Bagalkot - Gaddigoudar. Parvatagouda. Chandanagouda (BJP)

Bijapur - Ramesh Jigajinagi (BJP)

Haveri - Basavaraj Bommai (BJP)

Dharwad - Pralhad Joshi (BJP)

Uttara Kannada - Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri (BJP)

Shimoga - B.Y.Raghavendra (BJP)

Udupi Chikmagalur - Kota Srinivas Poojary (BJP)

Dakshina Kannada - Captain Brijesh Chowta (BJP)

Chitradurga - Govind Makthappa Karjol (BJP)

Tumkur - V. Somanna (BJP)

Mysore - Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar (BJP)

Bangalore Rural - Dr C N Manjunath (BJP)

Bangalore North - Shobha Karandlaje (BJP)

Bangalore Central - P C Mohan (BJP)

Bangalore South - Tejasvi Surya (BJP)

Chikkballapur - Dr.K.Sudhakar (BJP)

Chikkodi - Priyanka Satish Jarkiholi (Congress)

Gulbarga - Radhakrishna (Congress)

Raichur - G. Kumar Naik (Congress)

Bidar - Sagar Eshwar Khandre (Congress)

Koppal - K. Rajashekar Basavaraj Hitnal (Congress)

Bellary - E. Tukaram (Congress)

Davanagere - Dr. Prabha Mallikarjun (Congress)

Hassan - Shreyas. M. Patel (Congress)

Chamarajanagar - Sunil Bose (Congress)

Mandya - H.D. Kumaraswamy (JD(S))

Kolar - M. Mallesh Babu (JD(S))

Express Photos by Jithendra M.

Davanagere saw two debutantes in the fray from the Lok Sabha seat where Dr. Prabha Mallikarjun, wife of Mines and Geology and Horticulture Minister S S Mallikarjun, won in a tight battle against BJP's Gayithri Siddeshwara, wife of sitting Davanagere MP G M Siddeshwara by a margin of 26,094 votes 

Known as the ‘Manchester of Karnataka’ for its large cotton production, Davanagere is marked by the political rivalry between the Siddeshwara and Shamanur families, going back to the late ’90s. 

Former Karnataka Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar wins the Belgaum seat by 7.62 lakh votes beating Congress' Mrinal R Hebbakar by a margin of 1.78 lakh votes.

CM Siddaramaiah said "I am not sure who will form the government, but BJP does not have simple majority to form government. It is a defeat of the BJP at the national level. On moral grounds, Narendra Modi-ji has no right to become the Prime Minister of the country."

While Karnataka recorded its best-ever voter turnout of 69.9 per cent for a general election, the number of Lok Sabha seats won by the Congress has seen a gradual decline. In 2019, the grand old party won just one seat in the parliamentary polls, a major embarrassment for a party which was ruling the state in coalition with the Janata Dal (Secular) or JD(S).

BJP's Tejasvi Surya in his second Lok Sabha elections rose victorious by gaining 7.50 lakh votes in the Banglore South constituency after beating Congress' Sowmya Reddy by a margin of 2.77 lakh votes. 

In 2019 polls, Tejasvi Surya made his debut defeating the senior Congress leader B K Hariprasad by over 3.30 lakh votes. With an electorate of over 22 lakh, the constituency has been electing a BJP MP for the last eight consecutive times since 1996.

"The Congress has performed much better than the previous elections. We faced a setback in old-Mysore region. Personally, I have many doubts (about the results) which I will not discuss. I accept the results.We were expecting 14-15 seats, including my seat (Bangalore Rural), one seat in Bengaluru, Chitradurga and some seats in Kittur Karnataka. I am owning the responsibility of defeat especially in my constituency (Bangalore Rural)." says Karnataka Deputy CM DK Shivakumar reacting to the Congress winning 8 seats in the Lok Sabha polls. 

This also comes after his brother and two time MP DK Suresh lost from the Bangalore Rural constituency to BJP's Dr. CN Manjunath.

Karnataka has a total of 28 Lok Sabha constituencies, with five seats reserved for Scheduled Caste (SC) candidates and two for Scheduled Tribe (ST) candidates. In the previous 17th Lok Sabha Elections (2019), the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) secured a total of 26 seats, with the BJP alone winning 25 seats, with the alliance of the Indian National Congress (INC) and the Janata Dal (Secular) (JD(S)) managed to capture only two seats.

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E Tukaram beats Sreeramulu in Karnataka's mining capital

Political circles in Bellary strongly had suggested that there is a “huge” anti-incumbency factor against Sriramulu. Not because of his close association with Janardhan Reddy but because his promises of development have fallen flat and his inaccessibility to the people.

Congress's Sagar Eshwar Khandre win from the Bidar Lok Sabha seat

The ruling party in the state began a big lead, of nearly 1 lakh, in only one seat – Bidar, where minister Eshwar Khandre’s son Sagar Khandre is in the fray against BJP MP Bhagwant Khuba.

Dr K Sudhakar, who was health minister in the Basavaraj Bommai-led BJP government in the state, wins from the Chikkaballapur seat with a margin of over 1 lkah 63 thousand votes.

Located along the Karnataka-Andhra Pradesh border, Chikkaballapur was a Congress stronghold in 10 Lok Sabha polls between 1977 and 2014. It is now among the south Karnataka constituencies where the BJP hopes its alliance with the JD(S) will help it win.

Chikkaballapur is part of the belt where the Vokkaliga community is dominant. According to estimates, the community constitutes around a third of the population in the constituency, which also has a sizeable number of Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe, Lingayat, Balija and minority voters.

Now, one would imagine as to why we are talking about the 1984 elections. The BJP’s slogan for ‘400-paar’ this year mimics the result that the Congress managed in 1984. As such, we draw parallels between the two — of the 23 states and Union territories with more than one Lok Sabha seat at the time, the party swept nine — including Madhya Pradesh (40 seats), Rajasthan (25), Haryana (10), Delhi (7) and Himachal Pradesh (4).

The Congress also dominated several other states, particularly Uttar Pradesh (including Uttarakhand at the time), where it won 83 of the 85 seats; Bihar (including Jharkhand), winning 48 of 54; Maharashtra, 43 of 48 seats; Gujarat, 24 of 26 seats; Karnataka, 24 of 28 seats; and Odisha, 20 of 21 seats. Barring in Odisha, the Congress performance in 1984 almost matches the BJP’s in 2019.

Where the Congress did better was in the states where the BJP is still trying to make inroads. The Congress won nearly half the seats in Tamil Nadu (25 of 39), aided by ally AIADMK, which picked up 12 additional seats. In Kerala, the Congress got 13 of 20 seats. In Jammu and Kashmir (including Ladakh), the Congress won 3 of 6 seats.

Former speaker and BJP leader Vishweshwara Hegde Kengeri wins against Congress candidate Anjali Nimbalkar  in Uttara Kannada constituency by a amargin of over 3.3 lakh votes.

This takes the BJP tally in the state to 11 Lok Sabha seats

Joshi won his fifth Lok Sabha election this time. While three of his four wins have been from Dharwad, one was from Dharwad North, which ceased to exist after the 2008 delimitation.

In the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections, Joshi had won against the Congress’s Vinay Kulkarni. While the margin was 1.11 lakh votes in 2014, Joshi almost doubled it in 2019, winning by 2.05 lakh votes.

About half a dozen relatives of the Congress ministers and leaders – including party chief Mallikarjun Kharge’s son-in-law Radhakrishna Doddamani from Gulbarga– were in the fray on the Congress tickets. The party depended on the implementation of its 2023 poll guarantees to deliver the electoral dividends.

Once a bastion of the Congress, the party’s dominance was breached in 2019 when the BJP secured a shock win after Umesh Jadhav a medical doctor belonging to the SC sub-community of the Lambanis turned giant slayer to defeat AICC president Mallikarjun Kharge.

"People's decision is final. I welcome it with respect. @DrCNManjunath My best wishes to him. I hope the new MP will do good work in Bangalore Rural constituency. Our cooperation will be with you for the growth of the sector. Good luck," losing Congress candidate D K Suresh said in a video statement via his post on X earlier today.

This was the only seat the Congress had won in 2019, when the BJP swept the state to win 25 of the 28 Lok Sabha seats.

• About 80% of Lingayats have backed the BJP, according to Axis My India exit poll
• The wealthy, land-owning Vokkaligas have also sided with the BJP, exit poll predicts
• Scheduled Castes and Kurubas have supported the Congress, exit poll shows

Radhakrishna Doddamani, son-in-law of AICC president Mallikarjun Kharge wins from Gulbarga

"We all are happy that Prajwal Revanna lost the elections. He should also be punished for the crimes that he has committed. We dont know we will be able to lead normal life but for the cruelty he has committed, he should pay," a family member of a rape victim in the ongoing Prajwal Revanna case told The Indian Express.

The first FIR against Prajwal was filed on April 28, based on the complaint of a woman whose family has now left their home. With video clips being circulated of multiple women who were allegedly sexually assaulted by JD(S) MP Prajwal Revanna, several women who were purportedly among the victims have left their homes in Karnataka’s Hassan district after.

Prajwal who fled the country after polling in the constitutency on April 26 returned on May 31. He is under SIT custody.

Today, he lost the polls to Congress candidate Shreyas Patel, making it the first time that JD(S) is losing power in this seat in 25 years.

"We all are happy that Prajwal Revanna lost the elections. He should also be punished for the crimes that he has committed. We dont know we will be able to lead normal life but for the cruelty he has committed, he should pay," a family member of a rape victim in the Prajwal Revanna case told The Indian Express.

With video clips being circulated of multiple women who were allegedly sexually assaulted by JD(S) MP Prajwal Revanna, several women who were purportedly among the victims have left their homes in Karnataka’s Hassan district. After pollin gin the constituency on April 26, Prajwal fled the country before returning on May 31 and surrendering to the probing SIT.

Today, he lost the polls to Congress candidate Shreyas Patel.

D K Suresh concedes defeat to BJP's Bangalore Rural candidate Dr C N Manjunath

'I welcome the mandate of the public. I congragulate Dr CN Manjunath for his win. I will be with the workers of the constituency. I accept the defeat:' DK Suresh, former Bengaluru rural MP.

This was the only seat the Congress had won in 2019, when the BJP swept the state to win 25 of the 28 Lok Sabha seats.

BJP retains Dakshina Kannada seat as Capt Brijesh Chowta wins from the segment. Chowta had replaced three-time MP Nalin Kumar Kateel.

Captain Brijesh Chowta of the BJP, 42, had declared assets worth Rs 70.56 lakh, making him the candidate with the lowest assets.

BJP candidate PC Mohan wins Bangalore Central seat for the fourth consecutive time defeating Congress candidate Mansoor Ali Khan.

CV Raman Nagar and Mahadevapura which are Mohan's stronghold constitute over one lakh votes.

Located along the Karnataka-Andhra Pradesh border, Chikkaballapur was a Congress stronghold in 10 Lok Sabha polls between 1977 and 2014. It is now among the south Karnataka constituencies where the BJP hopes its alliance with the JD(S) will help it win.

Chikkaballapur is part of the belt where the Vokkaliga community is dominant. According to estimates, the community constitutes around a third of the population in the constituency, which also has a sizeable number of Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe, Lingayat, Balija and minority voters.

Udupi-Chikmagalur falls partly in coastal Karnataka, often dubbed the “laboratory of Hindutva”, and partly in Malnad. As in other constituencies in the coastal Karnataka region, such as Dakshina Kannada, the Hindu right wing has been a dominant force in Udupi-Chikmagalur that was at the centre of the hijab row a couple of years ago. The Congress, facing an uphill battle, banked on the Siddaramaiah government’s guarantee schemes and local caste and community factors to go toe-to-toe with the BJP in Udupi-Chikmagalur and Dakshina Kannada, which went to polls in the second phase of the Lok Sabha Elections on April 26.

Though the “saffron wall” in this part of Karnataka took some hit last year as the Congress swept back to power in the state elections — at present, four Assembly segments in the Chikmagalur area of Udupi-Chikmagalur are with the Congress and in Dakshina Kannada, the party managed to win Puttur after almost a decade — it remains a challenge to break it down in the Lok Sabha elections.

Karnataka vote share increase for Congress is 13 per cent from 32 to 45 per cent. BJP is down from 51 per cent to 44 per cent. JD(S) has done well for a party contesting only three seats compared to seven in 2019. It has got eight per cent compared to 10 in 2019, as per data available till 1 pm.

Congress vote percent in 2024 Lok Sabha is improvement of nearly two percent on state polls.

Priyanka Jarkiholi, daughter of Karnataka PWD minister Satish Jarkiholi wins from Chikkodi constituency. She defeated sitting MP Anna Saheb Jolle

E Tukaram triumphs over former minister and senior BJP leader B Sreeramulu in Bellary. Sreeramulu also lost the assembly elections in 2023 from the Bellary rural seat

Sunil Bose wins from Chamarajanagar constituency

Shreyas Patel beats Prajwal Revanna in Hassan

BJP candidate B Y Vijayendra wins from Shimoga constituency

At Haveri constituency, BJP candidate and former CM Basavaraj Bommai wins

BJP candidate from Chikkaballapur constituency and former minister Dr K Sudhakar wins by more than one lakh votes

BJP candidate and former minister Govind Karjol wins from Chitradurga

Former CM H D Kumaraswamy wins from Mandya constituency, he contested on a BJP-JD(S) alliance ticket

B Y Raghavendra, son of BJP Parliamentary Board member and former CM B S Yediyurappa beats longtime BJP leader and former Deputy Chief Minister K S Eshwarappa. The latter decided to contest as an Independent after the BJP denied a ticket to his son K E Kantesh, who was an aspirant for the neighbouring Haveri Lok Sabha constituency.

Former CM H D Kumaraswamy (BJP-JD(S) alliance) wins from Mandya constituency

BJP candidate and former minister Govind Karjol wins from Chitradurga

Congress candidate E Tukaram triumphs over former minister and senior BJP leader B Sreeramulu in Bellary. Sreeramulu also lost the assembly elections in 2023 from the Bellary rural seat.

Congress's Sunil Bose wins from Chamarajanagar constituency.

JD(S) has lost the Hassan seat for the first time in 25 years. Congress candidate Shreyas Patel has defeated JD(S) candidate Prajwal Revanna, accused of rape and sexual assault.

Before Revanna was elected MP in 2019, the constituency was represented by former PM H D Deve Gowda

Some of the constituencies which are seeing a close contest are:

Gulbarga where AICC president Mallikarjun Kharge's son-in-law Radhakrishna Doddamani is leading by 10,000 votes against BJP's Umesh Jadhav,

Koppal where Congress is leading by 3,800 votes,

Davanagere where Congress is leading by 10,000 votes,

Hassan where Congress candidate Shreyas Patil is leading by 13,000 votes and

Haveri where BJP is leading by 27,000 votes.

The BJP was ahead in 16 seats, Congress in 10 and JD(S) in two as per the latest counting figures, according to Election Commission officials.

The Congress won a mere one seat out of the total 28 in the State in the 2019 general elections.

BJP had swept the previous Lok Sabha elections bagging 25 seats, while an independent backed by it also won.

JD(S), headed by former Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda, had emerged victorious in one constituency. The Congress and the JD(S) were running a coalition government back then and had fought the election together.

In Bangalore South, sitting MP and BJP Yuva Morcha president Tejasvi Surya has extended his lead by more than 2.1 lakh votes

Mrinal Hebbalkar is trailing at Belgaum by 44000 votes and Samyukta Patil by 14000 votes at Bagalkot.

Three of the five children of Karnataka ministers who contested the polls are leading. Sunil Bose is leading by over 43000 votes at Chamarajanagar, Sagar Khandre by 80000 votes at Bidar and Priyanka Jarkiholi by 47,000 votes.

Former BJP deputy chief minister KS Eshwarappa who had contested as a rebel independent candidate against Former chief minister BS Yediyurappa's son BY Raghavendra in Shivamogga Loksabha constituency has failed to make his mark as he has only managed to secure 17,000 votes by 11.30 am while Raghavendra is leading with a mammoth 1.34 lakh  votes. 

At Hassan, Congress candidate Shreyas Patel is leading by around 4,000 votes against Prajwal Revanna by a slim margin of 4,000 votes.

The sitting MP from Hassan is in the eye of a storm after multiple cases of sexual assault and rape were registered against him mere hours after polling ended in constituencies of Southern Karnataka on April 26. He is the grandson of Deve Gowda, who had ceded his seat to him in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Hassan is considered a JD(S) bastion and the accused MP is expected to sail through in the election. The political discourse in Hassan, which is marred by drought, bad roads and delayed projects, revolves more around the control of the Deve Gowda family over the region.

Congress appears close to winning a seat in Bengaluru for the first time in more than 15 years as party candidate Mansoor Ali Khan is leading against BJP's three-time MP PC Mohan

K S Eshwarappa contesting from Shimoga as an Independent candidate is trailing by over 37,000 votes, as of 11.45 am

“The BJP in Karnataka is now following the Congress culture. Though Prime Minister Narendra Modi is against family politics, in Karnataka, the party is facing problems because of a father and his sons (Yediyurappa and sons Raghavendra and B Y Vijayendra, who is an MLA and state BJP president). I agreed not to contest in the Assembly elections after Yediyurappa promised that my son would get a ticket from the Haveri Lok Sabha constituency. But he betrayed us,” said K S Eshwarappa, who contested as an Independent after his son was denied a BJP ticket, which then went to Yediyurappa’s son and sitting BJP MP B Y Raghavendra.

READ HIS FULL INTERVIEW HERE

Two more states to keep an eye out for will be Tamil Nadu and Kerala, where the BJP is aiming to make massive inroads. According to most of the exit polls, in Tamil Nadu and Kerala, the saffron party is expected to get somewhere between one and four seats. Both India Today-My Axis and ABP-CVoter gave NDA 2-4 seats in Tamil Nadu and between one and three seats in Kerala. In Andhra Pradesh, with 25 seats, the NDA is projected to sweep the polls; YSRCP’s 2019 tally is predicted to fall from 22 to just between 2 and 4 seats. All exit polls predicted huge gain for the TDP with its ally BJP also gaining between four and six seats. In Telangana, too, BJP is expected to improve its tally.

Davangere 
Congress candidate Dr Prabha Mallikarjun leads by 3000 votes against BJP candidate Gayithri Siddeshwara

Koppal 
Congress candidate K Rajashekar Basavaraj Hitnal leads by 2000 votes against BJP’s Dr Basavaraj Kyavator 

Bellary 
BJP leader B Sreeramalu trails by 15,000 votes against Congress candidate E Tukaram

BJP Union Minister Pralhad Joshi leads against Congress candidate Vinod Asooti in Dharwad Loksabha constituency by 37,881 votes 

Former speaker and BJP candidate Vishweshwara Hegde Kageri leading against Congress Anjali Nimbalkar in Uttara Kannada Loksabha constituency by 1.21 lakh votes

At Shimoga, BJP's B Y Raghavendra, son of former CM B S Yediyurappa is leading against Congress Geetha Shivarajkumar by 73,996 votes. BJP rebel K S Eshwarappa has polled around 9,557 votes. 

Congress Sunil Bose leads against BJP's S Balaraj in Chamarajanagar Loksabha constituency by 24,668 votes. Sunil Bose is son of Karnataka minister HC Mahadevappa 

BJP's Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar leads against Congress M Lakshmana in Mysuru-Kodagu Loksabha constituency by 57,294 votes.

In 2004 
 BJP 18
 INC-8
 JD(S)-2
 ----
 2009 
 BJP-19 
 INC-6
 JD(S)-3
 -----
 2014
 BJP- 17
 INC-9
 JD(S)-2 
 -
 2019 
 BJP-25
 INC-1 
 Independent-1 
 JD(S)-1 
 --
 2024 (till now) 
 BJP-18 
 INC-7
 JD(S)-3

Congress debutant Mansoor Ali Khan is leading in the Bangalore Central constituency with over 20,000 votes as of 10.45 am, the EC data shows. Khan is the secretary of the KK Educational & Charitable Trust that runs the Delhi Public School (DPS) across the country

He is up against three-time BJP MP P C Mohan.

However, in the 2019 polls Congress candidate Rizwan Arshad held a similar lead till the end of polling day. But was overtaken by Mohan. Trends of past Lok Sabha results show that out of the eight Assembly segments within it, significant leads in Mahadevapura and C V Raman Nagar (both SC-reserved seats) have always helped the BJP win Bangalore Central, a constituency whose population comprises 17% Muslims and nearly 5% Christians. 

So this fight is going to be an interesting one to watch out. STAY TUNED!

Bengaluru Central
Congress candidate Mansoor Ali Khan leads by over 8000 votes against BJP's PC Mohan 

Bengaluru South
BJP MP Tejasvi Surya who is seeking a second term is leading against Congress candidate Sowmya Reddy by over 81,000 votes

Bengaluru North
BJP candidate Shobha Karandlaje leads by 49,000 votes against Congress candidate Prof Rajeev Gowda 

Bengaluru Rural 
DK Suresh, sitting MP and brother of deputy chief minister DK Shivakumar is trailing against BJP candidate Dr CN Manjunath by 83,000 votes

BJP's coalition partner JD(S) is in the race from three constituencies.

Prajwal Revanna from Hassan

Dr C N Manjunath from Bengaluru Rural

H D Kumaraswamy from Mandya

All three are currently leading as per the Election Commission data

BJP - 17

Congress - 8

JD(S) - 3

Dr C N Manjunath is leading by over 50,000 votes in Bangalore Rural segment against D K Suresh, brother of DyCM and KPCC president D K Shivakumar. If exit polls are to believed then the BJP is expected to break the streak of three consecutive wins by Suresh.

This constituency, which includes parts of Bengaluru city, is witnessing one of the most high-profile contests in Karnataka. Two heavyweights – D K Suresh from the Congress and Dr C N Manjunath from the BJP – are in the fray. This was the only seat the Congress had won in 2019, when the BJP swept the state to win 25 of the 28 Lok Sabha seats.

While Suresh is the brother of deputy CM and KPCC president D K Shivakumar, Dr Manjunath is the son-in-law of JD(S) supremo and former PM H D Deve Gowda.

On polling day in Karnataka on April 26, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP and Bangalore South candidate Tejasvi Surya was booked after a complaint from a poll officer for allegedly soliciting votes on the ground of religion through social media.

A day earlier, Surya posted a video of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya and wrote that “PM Modi fulfilled the wish of crores of Indians” and “for Bharatiya has to survive, vote for Modi!” Moreover, the Election Commission (EC) notified that BJP leader CT Ravi was also booked for allegedly promoting hatred and enmity between citizens through social media.

With an electorate of over 22 lakh, the constituency has been electing a BJP MP for the last eight consecutive times since 1996. BJP stalwart and ex-Union minister Ananth Kumar represented it six times between 1996 and 2014. Making his debut in the 2019 polls, Tejasvi Surya had defeated senior Congress leader B K Hariprasad by over 3.30 lakh votes.

This time, the seat will witness a fight between the national president of BJP’s youth wing Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha and the Congress’s Sowmya Reddy, who lost the 2023 Assembly polls from Jayanagar by just 16 votes.

At Shimoga, BJP's B Y Raghavendra, son of former CM B S Yediyurappa is leading by over 30,000 votes. He is against Geetha Shivarajkumar, daughter of former CM S Bangarappa.

BJP rebel K S Eshwarappa has polled around 5,000 votes in the segment.

Shivamogga, officially still referred to as ‘Shimoga', is the site of one of the high-voltage election contests, with the spark fuelled by the rebellion of longtime BJP leader and former Deputy Chief Minister K S Eshwarappa. He decided to contest as an Independent after the BJP denied a ticket to his son K E Kantesh, who was an aspirant for the neighbouring Haveri Lok Sabha constituency.

Four of the five children of ministers contesting from Karnataka are leading -

Priyanka Jarkiholi, daughter of PWD minister Satish Jarkiholi at Chikkodi,

Sunil Bose, son of Social Welfare minister H C Mahadevappa at Chamarajanagar,

Sagar Khandre, son of forest minister Eshwar Khandre at Bidar and

Samyukta Patil, daughter of minister Shivanand Patil at Bagalkot.

Meanwhile, Women and Child Development minister Laxmi Hebbalkar’s son Mrunal Hebbalakar is trailing at Belgaum.