The schedules for the Karnataka assembly elections were released by the Election Commission on Wednesday. Rajiv Kumar, the chief election commissioner, announced during a press conference that the notification for the 224-member assembly elections will be released on April 13 and that the deadline for submitting nomination papers will be April 20. The 224-member Karnataka Legislative Assembly and the state’s next chief minister will be chosen in an election on May 10 that will have findings on May 13. It is expected to be a close contest between the ruling BJP and the opposition Congress, with the Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) playing a possible kingmaker role. The ruling BJP came to power in 2019 after the collapse of JD-S and Congress. It now remains to be seen whether the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) can buck a four-decade-old trend to script history or whether the grand old party Congress will upstage the saffron camp to up its stakes ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. In a press briefing on Wednesday, Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai said that the ruling BJP is confident of returning to power in Karnataka with an absolute majority.
Speaking to media, Bommai claimed that over the previous three and a half months, he had visited nearly every constituency in the State. I have every confidence that we will win with an overwhelming majority, and the BJP will retake control in 2023, he declared.
Speaking about how the party was connecting with the public, the Chief Minister said the BJP had used various means to reach out to the people, including digital technology and campaigning by top party leaders. To a question about the likely candidates for the election, Bommai said that in the BJP the process of releasing the list of candidates would start after election dates are announced.
“Already we have the survey reports (on winnable candidates). Along with that, we will collect the opinion of the people and the party workers at the district level and taluk level, which will be consolidated at the state level. It will be sent to the parliamentary board for approval,” he explained.
Pralhad Joshi, the Union minister of parliamentary affairs and MP from Karnataka’s Dharwad seat, said he was confident about the BJP coming back to power for the second consecutive term because of its government’s “historic” work for the development of the state.
“In view of the work that our double engine government has done for the development of the state under the guidance of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, I am fully confident that BJP will return to power with full majority in Karnataka under the leadership of Yediyurappa ji and Bommai ji,” he said.
Asked for his comment on the announcement of poll schedule, Joshi said the BJP government has done “historic work” for the development of Karnataka. People of Karnataka are keen on giving mandate to the BJP for the second consecutive term as they know “the history of the Congress”, he claimed.
“Congress makes false promises… They have not fulfilled the promises they made in Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and recently in Himachal Pradesh,” he charged.
