Bangalore: Karnataka by-poll results on Saturday came as a big blow to Janata Dal Secular as the Congress has decimated the party in its bastion Bangalore Rural and Mandya Lok Sabha seats. The Congress won both the seats with heavy margin.
Congress MLA DK Suresh won Bangalore Rural constituency by 1,36,996 votes and defeating former Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy's wife Anitha. Suresh is the younger brother of Congress strongman and senior MLA D K Shivakumar.
Meanwhile, Congress leader and Kannada actress Ramya also won Mandya Lok Sabha seat by 67,611 votes.
The voting for both the seats took place on August 21.
The Congress has maintained lead from the first round and with each passing hour its vote count kept on adding. A win in these two seats is expected to strengthen Chief Minister Siddaramaiah's position.
The Congress swept to power in the May Assembly polls and JDS had fought an acrimonious and bitter battle. The BJP had backed JDS candidates in the two segments, where bypoll was necessitated following the resignation of N Cheluvarayaswamy (Mandya) and Kumaraswamy (Bangalore Rural) who quit after being elected to the Assembly in May.
Mandya is a bastion of JDS, which won five of the eight Assembly seats in the district in the May elections.
In Bangalore Rural, where Kumaraswamy had won by 1.3 lakh votes in the 2009 Lok Sabha polls, the Congress has secured the support of Samajwadi Party MLA, C P Yogeeshwara, who had defeated Anitha Kumaraswamy in the May polls.
(With additional inputs from PTI)
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