With Janata Dal (S) candidate Raghavendra Sondur opting out of the fray, Dharwad constituency will see a straight fight between BJP and Congress though there are fourteen others in the field.
Fourteen candidates withdrew from the race on Monday, the last day for withdrawal of papers. While JD(S) candidate Raghavendra Sondur opted out of the race, Nasir Bagawan who had earlier been declared JD(S) nominee only to be superseded remains in the fray but as an Independent.
Sitting MP Prahlad Joshi is BJP candidate while Manjunath Kunnur is Congress nominee. Kashimsab Mulla (BSP) and Mahesh Talakalmath (NCP) are others from major parties. Hanumanth Niranjan is JD (U) candidate and there are ten Independents.
Zameer Khan Mustaq represents National Dehat Morcha.
The Janata Dal (S) finally stuck to its earlier decision of not fielding its candidate for Dharwad Lok Sabha constituency. Janata Dal(S) candidate Raghavendra Sondur withdrew his nomination on Monday, the last day for withdrawal.
His opting out of the fray was not unexpected. The district unit of the party after considering several names had failed to arrive at a consensus and had decided not to field anyone.
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Meanwhile, Nasir Bagwan from Belgaum district some how managed to get the ‘B’ form from the party supremo H D Deve Gowda. It had irked several party workers who raised their voice against Bagwan’s candidature. Some of them went to H D Kumaraswamy and expressed their anguish. Responding to the dissent, party higher ups had asked Bagwan not to file nomination.
However an unrelenting Bagwan filed his papers along with the ‘B’ form.
The JD(S) leadership realising that it had no chance of winning the seat in Dharwad, was inclined to opt out “in order to prevent division of ‘secular’ votes between Congress and JD(S) and to prevent ‘communal’ BJP from winning”.
To neutralise Bagwan, the party leadership issued ‘C’form to Raghavendra Sondur superseding Bagwan’s candidature as JD(S) nominee. Bagwan’s nomination as JD(S) candidate was subsequently rejected during the scrutiny of papers. However he had filed another nomination as an Independent to remain in the fray.
As the message spread that Nasir Bagwan was not going to be official candidate of JD(S), several Muslims rushed to the DC’s office and filed their nominations as Independents. Sondur who arrived to DC’s office on Monday morning withdrew his papers. He said the decision was his own.
“There are too many Muslims in the fray. As such I decided to opt out. There is no pressure to withdraw from any one,” he said.
After the scrutiny of nomination papers there were 30 candidates in the fray and the election officials were worried over the prospect of using two electronic voting machines in each polling booth as each EVM can accommodate 16 names. They were apprehensive that using two EVMs could create confusion among the voters. To meet any eventuality, arrangements were being made to get more EVMs to the constituency as there was possibility of the number of candidates finally in the fray exceeding 16.
On Monday, which was the last day for withdrawal of nominations, 3 pm was the deadline.
At 2.50 pm, only 11 candidates had withdrawn and officials were wondering whether the use of two EVMs in each booth would become inevitable. But to their relief, three more candidates came in within next ten minutes to announce that they were opting out.
They handed over the papers seeking their withdrawal to head quarter assistant (HQA) to DC Prakash Mallapur who is the assistant returning officer for Dharwad constituency.
Following are the candidates in the race for Dharwad constituency after the withdrawal of nominations.
Kashimsab Mulla (BSP), Manjunath C Kunnur (Indian National Congress), Mahesh G Talakalmath (NCP), Prahlad Joshi (BJP), Hanumanthasa Niranjan (JD-U), Ali Sandimani, Ashok Vishnusa Baddi, Ibrahim Kallimani, Gurupadagouda V Patil, J Bhasker, Basanagouda M Hanasi, Basavaraj Balannavar, Nasir Bagawan,
Ramachandra Mahar, Shankarappa Yadavannavar (all Independents) and Zameer Khan (Rastreeya Dehat Morcha).