K'ntka polls: 9 Muslims, including a woman, elected to Assembly

Bengaluru: In Karnataka, nine people from the Muslim community won elections to become MLAs for the term 2023-2028 and will join the Vidhan Soudha, Siasat reports.

In a state where the Muslim community is just over 13 per cent of the total population and where major issues like the Hijab and scrapping of the OBC quota happened, representation increased from the last times 7 to nine this time is an improvement.

The nine MLAs now represent 4 per cent of 224 seated Karnataka Vidhan Soudha.

Further, all nine winners were candidates fielded by Congress. JD(S), which fielded 23 Muslim candidates, completely failed in their attempt to woo Muslim voters as none of them won a seat.

When 2008 polls saw nine Muslim members in the Assembly, it was 11 in 2013. This time nine were from Congress and two from JD(S).

This time, both Owaisi-led AIMIM and the Students Democratic Party of India (SDPI), which fielded 16 candidates (11 Muslims, five others), couldn't win even win one seat. AIMIM only gathered 0.02 per cent of the total votes polled from the two seats it contested.

In the Uttar Belgaum seat, Asif Raju Sait won by 4231 votes, while in Uttar Gulbarga, Kaneez Fatima won by 2712 votes. They defeated BJP candidates Ravi B Patil and Chandrakant B Patil, respectively. Rizwan Arshad defeated BJP's N Chandra by 23194 votes in Shivajinagar.

Rahim Khan and HA Iqbal Hussain defeated JD(S) 's Suryakanth Nagamarpalli and Nikhil Kumaraswamy for 10780 votes and 10715 votes, respectively.

In Shanti Nagar, NA Haris defeated BJP's K Shivakumar by 7125 votes, and BZ Zameer Ahmed Khan defeated BJP's Bhaskar Rao by 53953 votes in Chamrajpet.

UT Khader Fareed and Tanveer Sait defeated BJP's Sathish Kumpala and S Satheesh Sandesh Swamy by 22790 votes and 31120 votes, respectively.

It was in 1978 Muslim participation in the Assembly was the most, and in 1983 it was the least. Sixteen and two Muslims in the respective years.