Sriramulu scored a massive win in Bellary

Mtoday news / PTI

Bellary (Karnataka), Dec 4: The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Karnataka Sunday suffered a severe drubbing at the hands of party rebels, mining barons Reddy brothers, in the Bellary Rural assembly seat bypoll as their associate B. Sriramulu scored a massive win, officials said.

Sriramulu, former BJP minister who contested as an independent after quitting the party, romped home with a huge majority of around 46,000 votes over his nearest rival B. Ramprasad of Congress, who he had beaten for the seat in the May 2008 assembly elections that brought the BJP to power for the first time in Karnataka.

 

 

BJP’s P. Gadilingappa was way behind with just 17,366 votes.

Sriramulu polled 74,527 votes to Ramprasad’s 27,737, spokesperson of the state election authorities told reporters at the end of counting that began around 8 a.m. Sunday.

Around 120,000 out of over 171,000 eligible voters had cast their ballots Nov 30 in the bypoll.

Thanking the people for electing him again, Sriramulu told reporters here that "BJP has been taught a lesson for ditching people who helped it to come to power".

With Sriramulu’s victory, Reddy brothers’ gamble in taking on BJP, in spite of the most aggressive of them, Gali Janardhana Reddy, being in Hyderabad jail in connection with illegal mining in Andhra Pradesh, has paid off.

The Reddy brothers, Janardhana, Karunakara and Somashekara, sons of a police constable in neighbouring Andhra Pradesh, made Bellary, the iron rich district 300 km north of Bangalore, their home and consider it as their pocket borough.

The three brothers are still in BJP, though the party has suspended Somashekara for campaigning for Sriramulu. Karunakara and Somashekara are assembly members while Janardhana is in legislative council.


Bellary poll outcome will not have impact on BJP govt: CM


Karnataka Chief Minister D V Sadananda Gowda today said the outcome of the November 30 Bellary bypoll, where rebel BJP leader and former minister B Sreeramulu contested as an Independent, would not have any impact on his government.

 

"The outcome of the bypoll will not have any impact on the BJP government," he told reporters in Bangalore.

He was optimistic that BJP candidate Gadilingappa would win the poll, counting for which will be held tomorrow.

Besides Sreeramulu and Gadilingappa, the other candidate is Congress’ Ramaprasad.

BJP sources said the party is in talks with five Independent legislators to secure support in case Sreeramulu wins and his supporters pose a threat to the government’s stability.

The five were sacked from the Ministry in 2010 after they aligned with party dissidents and withdrew support to the government. They were among the 16 MLAs disqualified. But the Supreme Court restored their membership in May this year.

The bypoll was necessitated when Sreeramulu, a trusted lieutenant of mining barons G Janardhana Reddy and G Karunakara Reddy, quit Assembly membership after being denied a ministerial berth following his indictment along with the Reddy brothers in the Lokayukta report on illegal mining.