Providing a nail-biting finish to the high-pitched Karnataka Assembly elections, Jayanagar constituency, where 16 votes separated the winner and the loser, became a talking point. As many as eight seats were decided by wafer-thin margins of less than 1,000 votes with the Congress and the BJP having five and three such victories, respectively.
In the run-up to the elections, observers had pointed out multiple reasons for the contests to heat up resulting in close contests and lower margins. Eventually, Gandhinagar (105 votes), Sringeri (201 votes), Malur (248 votes), and Kumta (676 votes) were among the five constituencies that witnessed close contests apart from Jayanagar. This apart, the BJP also won four constituencies by narrow margins that were between 1,000 votes and 2,000 votes.
As many as 42 seats, out of the 224, went to the wires with the outcome decided by less than 5,000 votes. In 2018, in contrast, 30 seats had been decided by votes less than 5,000, including five seats won with a wafer-thin margin of less than 1,000 votes.
Close contests
In the run-up to the elections, parties had been cagey about the number of closely contested seats, and had worked hard in such places. While the Congress had estimated that the contest in about 30 seats could be close, the Janata Dal (Secular) had estimated that to be in about 100 constituencies. Rebel factor, anti-incumbency, triangular fights, strong candidates, new candidates, local issues, and rights between political families were among those that had made predictions tough.
“The Congress, which had the lowest victory margin on average in 2018, has seen its margins dramatically increase from an average of 15,000 votes to 22,000 votes. On the other hand, the JD(S), which had the highest average margin of 22,000 votes, has seen it decline to 14,000 votes,” Venkatesh Thogarighatta, a political consultant, said.
However, the number of constituencies recording margins of less than 10,000 votes has been less than what was reported in 2018. While 80 constituencies had a winning margin of less than 10,000 votes in 2018 as many as 71 seats were decided by that margin this time.
DKS’s huge margin
In contrast, while KPCC president D.K. Shivakumar was the only candidate to record a winning margin of over one lakh votes. As many as 17 candidates won with a high margin between 50,000 and 1 lakh votes. In the margin between 30,000 votes and 50,000 votes, 42 candidates romped home to victory.
