Karnataka elections: Congress rejects Siddaramaiah's demand for ticket from Kolar

BENGALURU: In what could be seen as a clear setback for opposition leader Siddaramaiah ahead of the May 10 elections, the Congress on Saturday rejected his demand for a Kolar ticket. He will now contest only from Varuna, his home turf in Mysuru district. Former deputy CM Laxman Savadi, who had joined Congress from BJP on Friday has been given ticket to contest from Athani seat in Belagavi district.

The Congress on Saturday announced its third list of 43 candidates with 16 new faces. With this, the party has so far announced candidates for 209 seat and it may release names for remaining 15 seats any moment.
Like in 2018, when he contested from Chamundeshwari and Badami seats and won the latter, Siddaramaiah wanted to contest from two seat and had opted for Varuna and Kolar. But owing to the stiff opposition from within, the party decided to field him only one seat.
With this, KPCC president D K Shivakumar scored a goal over Siddaramaiah as he had been maintaining that nobody will be allowed to contest from two seats despite an aggressive push by the former CM's supporters. Kothur Manjunath has been Kolar ticket.
Siddaramaiah's camp follower and former minister Umashree has been denied ticket from Terdal seat in Bagalkot district. Siddappa Konnur has been chosen for the seat.

Surprisingly, sitting Kundgol MLA Kusumawati Shivalli, whose name was in the list of five sitting MLAs who were said to be denied tickets citing anti-incumbency, has been given ticket. However the decision on remaining four S Ramappa from Harihar, V Muniyappa from Sidlaghatta D S Hoolageri from Lingasguru and Akhanda Srinivasmurthy from.Pulakeshinagar in Bengaluru has been kept pending.
The party has also not announced a candidate for Hubballi- Dharwad Central seat hoping that former CM Jagadish Shettar may knock on its doors. Shettar is likely to rebel if the BJP high command did not reconsider its decision to field a new face from the seat and walk out of the saffron party like Savadi did on Friday.
Notwithstanding the AICC's decision at its Rajasthan plenary session not to encourage dynasty politics, the party has given ticket to Nivedit Alva, son of senior Congress functionary, from Kumta seat in Uttara Kannada district. In Mudigere, former minister Motamma's daughter Nayana Jyoti Jhawar is given a green signal. Former minister Suryanarayan's son Bharat Reddy has been fielded from Ballari City against BJP's Gali Somashekhar Reddy.
K M Shivalingegowda and N H Konareddy, new entrants to Congress from JDS, have been given tickets from Arsikere and Navalagund seats respectively. Former KAS officer Bhimasen Rao Shinde has been given ticket from reserved seat, Aurad, in Bidar district to take on sitting minister Prabhu Chavan who has been winning the seat since 2004.
Film producer Umapathi Srinivas Gowda has been given a ticket from Bommanahalli seat. He will take on BJP's Satish Reddy.