The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) announced Aravind Limbavali’s wife, Manjula, as their candidate for the Mahadevapura segment, ending days of speculation about the seat. The party released a list of 10 names on the evening of Monday, April 17, taking the total number of names released to 222. With this, only the candidates for the Assembly constituencies of Manvi and Shivamogga City are pending.
Sources in the party said the ticket had been given to Aravind's wife as sections of the party feared that an old controversy surrounding him would resurface. A resident of Whitefield said they were unhappy with Aravind Limbavali's work as an MLA. “There were big promises, but they did not translate into actual work. It is quite obvious that he suffers from strong anti-incumbency. But to field his wife instead is even worse,” said Sandeep Anirudhan of Namma Whitefield.
The BJP also chose Katta Jagadish, son of former BJP minister Katta Subramanya Naidu, as their candidate for Hebbal. Subramanya Naidu, who was MLA and minister, was caught up in Lokayukta cases for possessing assets disproportionate to his source of income and later, he was the subject of an investigation by the Enforcement Directorate. Jagadish, a former BBMP corporator, was also accused in the graft cases, but he was acquitted.
As the drama over former chief minister Jagadish Shettar joining the Congress refused to die, with several BJP leaders like Basavaraj Bommai, KS Eshwarappa and CN Ashwath Narayan criticising him for the move, the BJP named Mahesh Tenginakai as its candidate for Hubballi-Dharwad Central. Mahesh is the state general secretary of BJP and is considered to be a loyalist of BL Santhosh, the national general secretary of BJP.
In Mysuru’s Krishnaraja, the BJP announced the name of Srivatsa as its candidate, giving sitting MLA SA Ramdas a miss. Srivatsa is Mysuru’s BJP president. As the BJP failed to announce Ramdas’s name in the earlier two lists, tension mounted among his supporters that he might not be given the ticket and they staged a dharna and protests.
In Koppal, BJP MP Karadi Sanganna’s daughter-in-law Manjula Amaresh has been chosen to contest. For the last two days, Sanganna, a Lingayat leader, was said to be upset because he wanted to contest from Koppal and had been denied a ticket. Speculation was also rife that he would join the Janata Dal (Secular). Sanganna was supposed to go to Delhi on Monday morning and offer his resignation. But the BJP seemed to have put the matter to rest by giving his daughter-in-law the ticket.
The BJP announced Umesh Shetty as their candidate for Govindrajnagar, which was the seat of V Somanna.
The BJP has also announced Sanjeev Aihole for Nagthan constituency reserved for Scheduled Caste (SC), Rajkumar Patil for Sedam, Kalakappa Bandi for Ron and B Ramanna for Hagaribommanahalli.