Suspended JD(S) leader Prajwal Revanna loses Karnataka’s Hassan seat
Revanna, the grandson of former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda, was arrested on May 31 on charges of having raped several women.
Karnataka MP and suspended Janata Dal (Secular) leader Prajwal Revanna lost the Hassan Lok Sabha constituency to the Congress’ Shreyas M Patel, data from the Election Commission showed.
In the run-up to the second phase of polling in the state, the Bharatiya Janata Party and Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda’s Janata Dal (Secular) alliance faced mounting criticism after allegations of sexual abuse came to light against Revanna.
Patel won the seat with a margin of 42,649 votes, securing 6,72,988 votes out of 13,55,007 total votes. Revanna was behind at 6,30,339 votes.
Revanna, who is the grandson of Gowda, was arrested on May 31 on charges of having raped several women. He was suspended from the Janata Dal (Secular) on April 30.
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Hassan is one of 28 Lok Sabha seats in the state. It comprises eight Assembly segments. The constituency went to the polls in the second phase on April 26.
In 2019, the BJP won 25 out of the 28 seats in the state during the Lok Sabha polls while an independent candidate backed by the party won one seat.
The Congress and the Janata Dal (Secular), which were allies then, won a single seat each. The BJP’s vote share was 51.7%, ahead of the Congress’ 32.1% and the Janata Dal (Secular)’s 9.7%.
However, the Congress secured a clear majority in the Karnataka Assembly polls in May 2023, winning 136 of the 224 seats in the state.
The stakes were high for the Hindutva party in Karnataka after its performance in the Assembly polls that led to it losing the only state it was in power in southern India.
In coastal Karnataka, the Billavas, the largest community in the Dakshina Kannada constituency of which Mangaluru is a part, have been supporters of the BJP. This time, however, the BJP faced anger from the community over the lack of political representation.
Polling across 542 parliamentary constituencies was held across seven phases between April 19 and June 1. The Lok Sabha has 543 seats and a party or coalition needs 272 seats to form the government.
