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The speculation implicit whether the 93-year-old erstwhile Prime Minister H. D. Deve Gowda volition get 1 much accidental to service arsenic Rajya Sabha subordinate has ended with the BJP choosing OBC person and educationist Prof. M. Nagaraja arsenic its campaigner for the Rajya Sabha elections being held from Karnataka. Mr. Gowda is scheduled to discontinue from Rajya Sabha connected June 25.
The sanction of Prof. Nagaraja, who has been associated with RSS since his pupil days, was cleared by the enactment cardinal predetermination committee precocious successful the nighttime connected Sunday (June 7, 2026).
He volition person to record his nominations earlier 3 p.m. connected Monday (June 8, 2026) erstwhile the deadline closes.
Mr. Nagaraja, who hails from Hubballi, had earlier served arsenic BJP State vice president and besides subordinate of Karnataka Public Service Commission. He had besides served arsenic subordinate of the committee that looked into operation of bureau gathering nether the Party’s program to person a enactment bureau successful each district.
Mr. Gowda, who is the nationalist president of Janata Dal (S), had to beryllium connected the enactment of his state BJP to contention the Rajya Sabha elections arsenic his enactment did not person the indispensable fig of MLAs to guarantee his triumph connected its own.
The BJP choosing Prof. Nagaraja, who hails from OBC community, is besides being seen arsenic portion of governmental strategy by the enactment to marque inroads into the OBC ballot slope of the Congress successful the aftermath of its person Siddaramaiah stepping down arsenic Chief Minister.
The biennial elections person been necessitated owed to the status of erstwhile Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda, Leader of the Opposition successful the Rajya Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge, and BJP members Iranna Kadadi and Narayana Koragappa connected June 25.
While June 8 is the past time for filing nominations, they volition beryllium scrutinised connected June 9. The past time for withdrawal of nominations is June 11.
Polling volition beryllium held connected June 18. Counting of votes volition beryllium taken up astatine 5 p.m. connected the aforesaid day.
MLC polls
Meanwhile the BJP has besides fielded Lingaraj Patil and Raghu Kautilya arsenic its candidates for the forthcoming elections to the Legislative Council from the Assembly constituency. It has not fixed tickets to immoderate of it’s sitting MLCs who are retiring.
The biennial elections are being held arsenic 7 MLCs, who person been elected by the Legislative Assembly, are retiring connected June 30. The retiring MLCs are Govindaraju (Congress), Naseer Ahmed (Congress), M.T.B. Nagaraju (BJP), Prathap Simha Nayak (BJP), Thippannappa (Congress), Sunil Vallyapur (BJP) and B.K. Hariprasad (Congress).
The biennial elections to 7 assembly seats volition beryllium held connected June 18. The past time for filing nominations for MLC polls is June 11 portion polling by MLAs volition beryllium held connected June 18.
