Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge with party leader Sonia Gandhi during the Congress Central Election Committee (CEC) meeting for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls, at AICC Headquarters in New Delhi, Tuesday, March 19, 2024.
PTI Photo
New Delhi/Bengaluru: The Congress’ Central Election Committee on Tuesday cleared tickets to 16 Lok Sabha segments in Karnataka, which include children of five state Cabinet ministers.
Congress leaders are meeting again on Wednesday to decide on the remaining five seats.
Transport Minister Ramalinga Reddy’s daughter Sowmya Reddy (Bangalore South), Public Works Minister Satish Jarkiholi’s daughter Priyanka Jarkiholi (Chikkodi), Women & Child Development Minister Laxmi Hebbalkar’s son Mrinal (Belgaum), Agricultural Marketing Minister Shivanand Patil’s daughter Samyukta (Bagalkot) and Forest Minister Eshwar Khandre’s son Sagar Khandre (Bidar) will contest the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.
The committee, headed by Congress national president Mallikarjun Kharge, is yet to finalise the candidates for Kolar, Chitradurga, Chikkaballapur, Chamarajanagar and Bellary constituencies since many contenders are lobbying for tickets.
In Gulbarga, which is the All India Congress Committee (AICC) president’s turf, Kharge’s son-in-law Radhakrishna Doddamani will be the candidate.
For Davangere, the Congress has decided to field senior MLA Shamanur Shivashankarappa’s daughter-in-law Prabha Mallikarjun. Her husband SS Mallikarjun is the mines & geology minister.
Former IIM Bangalore professor M V Rajeev Gowda, who was earlier a Rajya Sabha member, got the Bangalore North ticket.
In Bangalore Central, the Congress is fielding Mansoor Ali Khan, son of former Rajya Sabha deputy chairperson K Rahman Khan.
The Congress had earlier announced candidates for seven seats.
For the Kolar seat, Food Minister K H Muniyappa insisted that ticket should be given to one of his family members while local leaders favoured former Rajya Sabha member L Hanumanthaiah.
Former MP B N Chandrappa and J J Hatti Thippeswamy, who lost the 2014 Lok Sabha seat from Congress from the same segment was lobbying for it. For Chikkaballapur segment, Raksha Ramaiah and former Minister H S Shivashankar Reddy demanded the tickets. From Bellary, Sowparnika alias Chaitnaya Thukaram and former Lok Sabha member V S Ugrappa were strong contenders while for Chamarajnagar seat, Sunil Bose, son of Social Welfare Minister H C Mahadevappa and former MLA Nanjundaswamy were lobbying.
Though the CEC cleared the name of Radhkrishna Doddamani, son-in-law of Congress president Mallikarjuna Kharge for the Gulbarga seat, the final decision was left to Kharge whether to field him or not.
The candidates
Bangalore North: M V Rajeev Gowda
Bangalore South: Sowmya Reddy
Bangalore Central: Mansoor Ali Khan
Mysore: M Laxmana
Davangere: Prabha Mallikarjuna
Dharwad: Vinod Asooti
Gulbarga: Radhakrishna Doddamani
Raichur: G Kumar Naik
Bagalkot: Samyukta Patil
Dakshina Kannada: Padmaraj
Udupi-Chikmagalur: Jayaprakash Hegde
Koppal: Rajshekhar Hitnal
Uttara Kannada: Anjali Nimbalkar
Bidar: Sagar Khandre
Belgaum: Mrinal Hebbalkar
Chikkodi: Priyanka Jarkiholi