CM-aspirant siddaramaiah wins

Congress leader and front-runner for the chief minister's post Siddaramaiah Wednesday won from the Varuna assembly constituency in Chamarajanagar district with a thumping majority of 29,641 votes, defeating Karnataka Janata Party (KJP) nominee K. Siddalingaswamy.

Siddaramaiah, a Backward Class leader from Kuruba (shepard) community, polled 84,385 votes as against 54,744 votes garnered by Siddalingaswamy and a paltry 2,686 votes of Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) candidate.

A former deputy chief minister in the first Congress-JD-S coalition government of 2004-06 in the state, Siddaramiah resigned from the JD-S and joined the Congress in August 2005 and became the leder of opposition in June 2008 following the assembly elections.

Campaigning extensively across the state, especially in the JD-S dominated old Mysore region, Siddaramiah led the Congress to victory in 121 of the 223 constituencies where polling was held Sunday.

Securing a comfortable majority in the 225-member state legislative assembly, which has one nominated from the Anglo-Indian community, the Congress will not require support of any other parties or independents to form the next government.

Thanking the electorate for his consecutive victory from the constituency as a Congress candidate, Siddaramaiah said the people had voted across the state for a stable government and brought about a sea change in the state politics.

"The mandate is clearly for change in the state politics. By voting the Congress back to power, people have voted for a stable government and development. It is a positive vote for our party and rejection of divisive politics of the BJP and the JD-S," a beaming Siddaramaiah told reporters in Mysore, about 150 km from here.

Siddaramaiah also ensured the party's victory in all the four assembly segments in his home district of Chamarajanagar.