MYSURU: Congress, which has fielded two candidates in the Rajya Sabha elections, will win both seats with the help of conscience votes of BJP and JD(S) MLAs, said Congress Legislature Party leader Siddaramaiah, here on Monday. After electing its first nominee Jairam Ramesh, Congress will have a surplus of 25 votes for its second candidate, Mansur Ali Khan. “We are confident of getting the votes of minority MLAs and others in JDS to ensure the victory of our minority candidate,” he said.
But he refused to say how many MLAs will support the second Congress candidate and added that they will get votes from disgruntled members of both parties. He said if JDS senior leader HD Kumaraswamy is firm on defeating the third BJP candidate, he should withdraw the party’s nominee and support Congress. He pointed out that Congress did not field any candidate when Deve Gowda contested the RS polls, despite knowing the regional party had just 37 votes.
He said CM Ibrahim is a figurehead president of JDS who acts as per the instructions of his masters. “Ibrahim claimed that he would be made an MLC. Did they make him,” he asked. On Kumaraswamy’s statement he went abroad when the Congress and JDS coalition government was facing a crisis only to let it collapse, Siddaramaiah said, “He had alleged that I had sent party MLAs to BJP to pull down his government,” he asked.