No idea whether Ambareesh accepted ticket or not, no plans to meet him: CM

Bengaluru, Jun 17: The Congress on Wednesday decided to field senior party leader B K Hariprasad and incumbent Naseer Ahmed as candidates for the coming legislative council polls in Karnataka.

"The Congress President Sonia Gandhi has approved the proposal for the candidature of B K Hariprasad and Naseer Ahmed as Congress candidates to contest the biennial elections to the Legislative Council of Karnataka to be elected by the MLAs," the AICC said in a release.

The election is necessitated as the term of seven MLCs- Naseer Ahmed, Jayamma, M C Venugopal, N S Bose Raju, H M Revanna (all Congress), T A Sharavana (JDS) and independent D U Mallikarjuna- will end June 30.

Polling will be held on June 29 to fill seven MLC berths, and June 18 is the last date for filing of nominations.

While the BJP is in a position to win four out of seven seats, the Congress can win two and the JD(S) one.

Twenty-eight valid votes of MLAs are required for each candidate to win.

Hariprasad’s candidature has been announced as his tenure in the Rajya Sabha is coming to end on June 25.

He has also served as general secretary of the party.

Naseer Ahmed, who is retiring as MLC on June 30, will be seeking another term.

According to state Congress president D K Shivakumar, more than 200 aspirants have sought tickets for the two seats that the party can win in the legislative council polls.

Bengaluru, Jun 4: Karnataka opposition leader Siddaramaiah created a flutter on Wednesday saying many disgruntled BJP leaders had met him.

"Many disgruntled BJP lawmakers have met me and, of course, expressed their displeasure," tweeted Siddaramaiah.

Congress leader Siddaramaiah''s statements assume significance as recently several reports emerged highlighting some north Karnataka legislators meeting over dinner to put pressure on Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa to expand the cabinet and offer them ministerial roles.

North Karnataka leaders such as Umesh V. Katti, Chitradurga MLA G. H. Thippareddy and Vijayapura MLA Basanagouda Patil Yatnal and others met over dinner.

However, the Chief Minister said he was too busy to even look at the dissidence because he is occupied with development work of the state and fighting Covid.

Siddaramaiah, the former chief minister, alleged that Yediyurappa''s son Vijayendra is functioning as a non-constitutional chief minister.

"This is true in the BJP. That dissent will continue. We are not responsible if the government collapses," he pointed out.

The Congress leader said Karnataka has stooped to the level of not being in a position to even pay salaries to its employees.

"The state was the first in economic discipline during our government. Now the government has no money to pay salaries to government employees. Not only the state but the entire country is financially bankrupt," he said.

Chennai, July 25: A widow living alone in her apartment in Chennai city suburbs has filed a police complaint against ABVP national president Dr Subbiah Shanmugam, accusing him of harassment, including urinating and throwing used surgical masks at her doorstep.

Shockingly, no action has been taken so far by the police, even though the complaint against Dr Shanmugam, who is in government service, was filed on July 11 at the Adambakkam Police Station here by the widow’s relative Balaji Vijayaraghavan. 

Dr Shanmugam and the 62-year-old widow were living in the same apartment complex in Nanganallur and an argument broke between them over a parking slot. “He wanted to use our parking lot. We agreed but demanded a nominal charge for using it. He was outraged by our demand and even broke our signboard at the parking lot,” Vijayaraghavan wrote in his complaint.

He also alleged that Dr Shanmugam began harassing her by throwing “pieces of chicken” outside her apartment despite knowing she is a vegetarian. Vijayaraghavan also alleged in his two-page written complaint that the ABVP National President had urinated outside the woman’s apartment gate and had been throwing garbage and used masks at her gate.

The 62-year-old woman has been living alone in her apartment for the last year following her husband’s death. In his complaint, Vijayaraghavan also said the family was “concerned about her safety”, while asking police to take action against Dr Shanmugam, who he says, “has a bad track record in maintaining rapport with neighbours.”

CCTV footage corroborates with the allegations of urinating outside the residence of the widow. However, the ABVP claimed the incident as a “malicious and derogatory propaganda” by the Congress’ student wing of NSUI.

Also Read: Finally FIR registered against ABVP national president for allegedly harassing widow