With 46 votes each, BJP Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and the Congress’ Jairam Ramesh were elected to the Rajya Sabha.
BJP leaders greet newly elected Rajya Sabha members Nirmala Sitaraman, Jaggesh and Lehar Singh Siroya. (Supplied)
With 46 votes each, Bharatiya Janata Party candidate and Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Congress candidate Jairam Ramesh were elected to the Rajya Sabha on Friday.
Of the four seats from Karnataka, the BJP clinched three seats.
The Congress was forced to settle for one after the HD Kumaraswamy-led Janata Dal (Secular) legislature party refused to extend support.
The only instance of cross-voting came from JD(S) MLAs.
The party’s Kolar legislator K Srinivas Gowda openly admitted to voting for the Congress.
“I voted for the Congress because I love it,” he told reporters at the Vidhana Sudha soon after polling.
Gowda’s cross-voting drew his party’s ire.
“If he has any self-respect, he should quit the party,” an irate Kumaraswamy told reporters at the Vidhana Soudha.
Former Karnataka chief minister and Congress legislature party chief Siddaramaiah on Thursday had written to JD(S) MLAs to cast “conscience votes” in favour of the Congress.
To stop MLAs from being lured by either party, Kumaraswamy herded them to a resort on Thursday.
The BJP ensured victory for all its three candidates — Nirmala Sitharaman, Jaggesh and Lehar Singh Siroya — in a tight contest for the fourth seat.
Despite not having enough numbers to get its third candidate elected on first-preference votes, the BJP used the tensions between the JD(S) and the Congress to good effect.
The Congress’ second candidate Mansoor Ali Khan and JD(S) candidate D Kupendra Reddy lost the elections, with the JD(S)’ refusal to retire Reddy and transfer votes to Khan seen as the reason.
The BJP’s Nirmala Sitharaman and the Congress’ Jairam Ramesh polled 46 first-preference votes each in an election where 45 are required to be elected.
Surplus first-preference votes from both the candidates were then transferred to other candidates from their parties.
In the first preference votes, Jaggesh polled 44 while Siroya received 33 votes.
Congress candidate Khan received 25 votes and JD(S) man Reddy managed 30 votes.
With the transfer of surplus first-preference votes and the counting of second-preference votes, Jaggesh and Siroya comfortably won the third and fourth Rajya Sabha seats.
Friday marked Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s second consecutive election to the Rajya Sabha from Karnataka.
The results are being looked at as an indicator of the directions that political calculations will take for the state Assembly election next year.
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