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Karnataka polls: 583 candidates withdraw nominations

According to numbers released by the Election Commission on Saturday, the BJP will be contesting all 224 assembly constituencies while the Congress has fielded candidates in 222 constituencies.

BENGALURU: A total of 583 candidates withdrew their nominations for contesting the upcoming assembly elections by close of day on Friday, the last date to do so. This leaves 2655 candidates in the race for elections scheduled on May 12. Out of this number, only 219 are women candidates with men dominating the candidate lists.

According to numbers released by the Election Commission on Saturday, the BJP will be contesting all 224 assembly constituencies while the Congress has fielded candidates in 222 constituencies. The Janata Dal (Secular) will contest 201 seats and the Bahujan Samaj Party will have candidates contesting 18 seats.

In the run up to Friday, 271 nominations were rejected by election officers for various reasons. For instance, in Sakleshpur, 7 nominations were rejected while in Chamarajnagar, 15 nominations were rejected. The 583 withdrawals happened after the initial round of applications were rejected.

Some constituencies will have up to 20 contestants like in Jamkhandi which has 12 independents contesting. Ballari city will see 28 candidates including 13 independent candidates contesting to win one assembly seat and Mulbagal will have 39 candidates out of which 35 are contesting independently.

Babaleshwar, Yeshwantpura, Rajajinagar and Chamaraja will have 4 women candidates while Bommanahalli in BBMP South zone will see 6 women candidates according to Election Commission Data.