NEW DELHI:

Siddaramaiah will be the next Chief Minister of Karnataka and DK Shivakumar his deputy, the Congress announced on May 18, ending five days of suspense after the party’s emphatic election win. The decision was announced after days of internal wrangling by Congress spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala at a news conference.

Mr Shivakumar had accepted the deputy CM position following an intervention by former Congress president Sonia Gandhi. The veteran leader had agreed to make the “sacrifice in the interest of the party”. Mr Siddaramaiah and Mr Shivakumar met Congress general secretary KC Venugopal on May 18 morning. This was the first meeting between the two leaders since the tussle for the top post began. The two leaders then went to meet Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge.

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BENGULURU:

Congress is leading in 131 seats out of the 224 Assembly seats as the counting of votes for the high stake Karnataka assembly elections 2023 is underway. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leads in 73 seats and the Janata Dal (S) in 18 seats with its leader H.D Kumaraswami trailing in his constituency.

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Winning the electoral contest in the southern state of Karnataka is key to the revival of its image as the main opposition player against the saffron party for the Indian National Congress.  A win in Karnataka will give the Congress a boost of sorts to take on the BJP later this year in the states of Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan.

During the election campaign in Karnataka run by its state leaders, the grand old party focussed on local issues.. This poll is also a prestige battle in a way for the party with a Kannadiga Mallikarjun Kharge, who hails from Kalaburagi district.

Though the campaign initially centered around its state leaders like Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar, Kharge gave it momentum and thereby prepared the pitch for the party’s top leaders Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi to join in. Their mother and former AICC president Sonia Gandhi addressed a party rally in Hubballi on Saturday.

The party held 99 public meetings and 33 roadshows by its top state and central leaders. The Congress has set a target of winning 150 seats, and has been urging voters to ensure that it gets an absolute majority, so that BJP doesn’t “steal” the mandate by managing defections of other party legislators and “manufacture” a majority in its favour. The Congress’s main issues to attack the BJP government in this election were over corruption/ scams and the charge of 40 per cent commission, coupled with the Adani issue.

The Congress’ has promised to implement ‘guarantees’ – 200 units of free power to all households (Gruha Jyoti), Rs.2,000 monthly assistance to the woman head of every family (Gruha Lakshmi), 10 kg of rice free to every member of a BPL household (Anna Bhagya), Rs.3,000 every month for graduate youth and Rs.1,500 for diploma holders (both in the age group of 18-25) for two years (YuvaNidhi), and free travel for women in public transport buses (Shakti), on the very first day, on coming to power in the state.

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Outgoing EC Lavasa has been appointed vice-president of Asian Development Bank. Lavasa still has over two years left in his term at the Election Commission. He would have retired as Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) in October 2022.

As Chief Election Commissioner, he would have conducted Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Manipur and Goa, among other states. His premature exit — the second in the Election Commission’s history — puts his colleague Sushil Chandra next in the line of succession.

Kumar, who retired as Finance Secretary on April 29 this year, was appointed Chairman of Public Enterprises Selection Board (PESB) for a period of three years. As Chief Election Commissioner, he is expected to oversee the next general election in 2024.

Born on February 19, 1960, Mr. Kumar is a 1984 batch IAS officer. He has been with the Central Service and the Bihar-Jharkhand State Services for over 36 years, liaising with various Ministries.

Mr. Kumar holds BSc, LLB, PGDM and MA Public Policy and has extensive experience in Social, Forest and Environment, Human Resources, Finance and Banking.

He is keen to periodically amend existing policy provisions and use technology in governance for the purpose of delivering services directly to citizens, eliminating intermediaries and greater transparency.

He retired as Union Finance Secretary in February 2020. He was subsequently appointed Chairman of the Public Enterprises Selection Board in April 2020. He resigned on 31st August 2020. He was the Establishment Officer of the Personnel and Training Department during the period 2015-17. Prior to that, he served as Joint Secretary, Department of Finance, Ministry of Forests, Environment, Tribal Affairs, and Department of Education in the State Service.

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Voters whose body temperature is found to be more than the safe threshold set by the Health Ministry will be checked twice, and if the result remains the same, then they will be asked to visit again in the last hour of polling. “At the last hour of poll, such electors shall be facilitated voting, strictly following COVID-19 related preventive measures,” the Election Commission said in its latest guidelines.

It said public meetings and road shows can be organised but must follow COVID-19 containment conditions set by the centre.

Candidates can file nominations and deposit security money online, the Election Commission said in the 12-page document titled “Broad Guidelines for Conduct of General Elections/By-Elections During COVID-19”.

Other standard safety measures like wearing masks, using sanitizers, installing thermal scanners and wearing personal protection equipment (PPE) kits will continue during the election process.
Elections are due in later this year in Bihar, which has reported 1.15 lakh coronavirus cases and over 570 deaths till now. The Election Commission, however, has not made any announcement about the schedule.
“Nodal health officer shall be designated for the state, the district and the assembly constituency to oversee COVID-19 related arrangements and, preventive measures during entire electoral process,” the Election Commission said. “Training for election officials may be organised through online mode,” it said.
A reserve pool of polling, counting and other staff will be maintained by the Returning Officer to replace election staff who show symptoms of coronavirus infection.

Only two people and two vehicles can accompany a candidate if coming to the election office to file papers.
“Returning Officer’s chamber should have sufficient space to perform the functions of nomination, scrutiny and symbol allocation following social distancing norms. Returning Officer should allot staggered time in advance to prospective candidates,” the Election Commission said.

The carrying cases of control units and voter-verifiable paper trail will be sanitised before they are placed on counting tables.

In Bihar, except for Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal (United) and the BJP, almost all major political parties have demanded that elections be postponed due to the coronavirus threat.

“What sort of elections would be held under these circumstances? Every polling station will turn out to be a coronavirus infection centre after elections, and it is difficult to predict the extent to which the disease might spread,” former union minister Yashwant Sinha said on August 20.

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Opening the way for President Vladimir Putin, Russians voted for a package of constitutional changes that would allow him to stay in power until 2036. According to Russia’s Central Election Commission, 78% of votes counted had supported in favour and 21% had voted against the constitutional changes. The overall turnout was 65% and in some regions, almost 90% of eligible voters cast votes, the election officials said.

However critics questioned the turnout figures and said the outcome was falsified on an industrial scale. Opposition politician Alexei Navalny called the vote an illegitimate and illegal show designed to legalise Putin’s presidency for life.On the other hand, Ella Pamfilova, head of the commission, said the vote had been transparent and that officials had done everything to ensure its integrity.

Meanwhile, several activists staged a symbolic protest on Red Square on July 1 forming the date – 2036 – with their bodies in protest before being detained by police. In the event, dozens of people protested amid a heavy police presence and demanded for the resignation of Putin.

Vladimir Putin is the longest-serving Russian leader since Josef Stalin

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