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Journalism of Courage
After a neck-and-neck dramatic race that went way past midnight, a re-verification of postal ballots led to the BJP’s C K Ramamurthy being declared the winner from the Jayanagar seat in Bengaluru over the Congress’s Sowmya Reddy by 16 votes — the narrowest of the Karnataka elections. The Congress has said it would go to court over the matter.
However, the swinging pendulum between the two main candidates wasn’t the only twist in this tale. So were two others — an Independent candidate called Sowmya A Reddy, who the Congress believes took away crucial 320 votes from the party’s Sowmya Reddy; and another Independent candidate called B Ramamurthy, who won 203 votes. Crucially, if the two did take away votes of the two main candidates, Sowmya may have hurt her namesake more than Ramamurthy did his.
The Congress has accused the BJP of propping up Sowmya A Reddy. Sources in the party say she just filed her nomination and did not even campaign. “She did not even come to the counting centre but stayed at her residence. It cost the Congress heavily,” a worker said.
B Ramamurthy managed to bag 203 votes. A producer and entrepreneur, he said: “I wanted to contest for corporator elections, but that did not happen. So, I contested in this election. I have been part of the Kannada Sangha in the area for many years.”
In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, when actor Sumalatha Ambareesh contested as an Independent against Nikhil Kumaraswamy, the son of JD(S) leader H D Kumaraswamy, there were three other Independents in the name of Sumalatha. They even managed to get 20,000 votes in total. However, that time Sumalatha was not much affected as her victory margin was 1,25,876 votes.
In the narrowest margin ever recorded in Karnataka, late Congress leader R Dhruvanarayana defeated JD(S) candidate Krishna Murthy A R from Santhemarahalli constituency in 2004 by 1 vote. This seat too also saw Independents with the same name as the main contenders — the BSP’s Krishna Murthy, who secured 5,472 votes; and the Janata Party’s Krishna Murthy M S, who got 2,385 votes.
Jayanagar was a tight contest from the start, but things got intense by Round 5 of counting. The BJP’s Ramamurthy led by 492 votes at this time. By Round 10, the Congress’s Sowmya was ahead by 15,157 votes. Then, Ramamurthy staged a comeback. Round 14 saw the Congress candidate’s lead drop to 3,681. By the penultimate round, it was down to 473; and then in the last round, Sowmya had a 294-vote lead.
A re-verification of all postal ballots was ordered as per EC rules as the victory margin was lower than the total number of postal ballots (750). The rules mandate that all postal ballots — including those rejected as invalid and those counted in favour of each candidate — have to be verified again and tallied in the presence of an observer and the returning officer.
