V Somanna to K Sudhakar, 13 BJP ministers bite the dust in Karnataka polls

Along with Revenue Minister R Ashok, Somanna was among the two senior leaders whom the party’s central leadership picked to contest from two constituencies. Ashok lost to Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) president D K Shivakumar from Kanakapura by 1.21 lakh votes but managed to retain Padmanabhanagar in Bengaluru South by 54,734 votes, winning his seventh consecutive Assembly election.

Nagesh, the School Education and Literacy Minister, who was at the centre of the hijab row in the state year also lost from Tiptur in Tumakuru district to the Congress’s K Shadakshari by 17,662 votes.

Among the ministers were four rebels who defected to the BJP in 2019, leading to the fall of the Congress-JD(S) government. Health Minister K Sudhakar was one of the four, losing Chikkaballapur to the Congress’s Pradeep Eshwar by 11,159 votes. Agriculture Minister B C Patil lost to Congress’s U B Banakar by 15,011 votes in Hirekerur in Haveri district. The prospects of a possible BJP win in Mandya district, where the BJP launched its campaign for the 2023 polls, were dashed as Horticulture Minister K C Narayana Gowda was relegated to third place in Krishnarajpet. Gowda won the constituency as a Janata Dal (Secular) candidate in 2018 and won the bypoll on a BJP ticket the following year.

Small-scale industries minister M T B Nagaraj, also among the defectors, lost his second consecutive election. He fell to the Congress’s Sharath Bachegowda, losing by 5,172 votes in Bengaluru Rural’s Hosakote constituency. Nagaraj won in 2018 on a Congress ticket but lost the 2019 bypoll. He was subsequently nominated as an MLC and then appointed minister.

Prominent Scheduled Tribes (ST) leader B Sriramulu, the minister of transport and tribal welfare, suffered a heavy defeat in Bellary where B Nagendra of the Congress defeated him by 28,999 votes. Public Works Department (PWD) minister Govind Karjol, a former Deputy Chief Minister during B S Yediyurappa’s chief ministerial tenure from 2019 to 2021, lost from Mudhol constituency in Bagalkot district, while Industries minister and industrialist Murugesh Niranim who also hails from the same district, lost from Bilgi. The other ministers who lost are J C Madhuswamy (Chikkanayakanahalli, Tumkur district), Shankar Patil Munenkoppa (Navalgund, Dharwad district), and Halappa Achar (Yelburga, Koppal district).

The BJP also lost the constituency represented by former minister Anand Singh, who fielded his son Siddharth Singh from the seat. Singh lost to Congress candidate H R Gaviyappa. In 2018, 10 Congress ministers were defeated in the polls.