BENGALURU: The first phase of much-hyped up Youth Congress elections started on Sunday morning, with two more phases scheduled for Monday and Tuesday. In the first phase, the polls were held in Bagalkot, Bengaluru South, Belagavi City, Belagavi Rural, Ballary City, Chamarajanagar, Chikkamagaluru, Chikkodi, Chitradurga, Kolar, Mysuru city and Shivamogga.
The remaining areas will be covered over the next two days. Because of Covid restrictions, voting is only online. Also, only those enlisted as Youth Congress members can cast their votes, with the party putting up safeguards against proxy voting.
When the elections concluded at 6 pm on Sunday, around 59,269 members had cast their votes out of the total of 1,40,558 voters, which works to around 42 per cent. The highest voting was in Belagavi City at 72 per cent, Kolar 54 per cent and Bagalkot 53 per cent.
After Mithun Rai withdrew from the contest, the fight now appears between Nalapad Haris, Raksha Ramaiah and H S Manjunath. Rai, after withdrawing his nomination, had put up a Facebook post on Saturday evening, saying he was following the orders of party state president D K Shivakumar.
The KPCC president, however, denied that he was getting involved in the Youth Congress elections, and said, “The polls will take take place in a transparent manner.’’ On the withdrawal of Mithun Rai, he said, “I had asked him to pull out because he has bigger responsibilities in Mangaluru and Dakshina Kannada.”
He said, “Our party wants leaders to grow from taluks, districts.
That is why the party constitution was amended. We have stopped student body elections, and that is the reason we are holding the Youth Congress polls.” He said, “As the president of the party, I will not support or oppose any candidate.”