Karnataka assembly polls: Polling on May 10, results on May 13

The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Wednesday announced the dates of the Karnataka Assembly election. The ECI said that the election Model Code of conduct will be implemented from today (March 29).

The election will be held for all 224 assembly constituencies on May 10, while the result will be declared on May 13.

The Congress party has announced its first list of 124 candidates on March 25. Former Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah will contest from Varuna and Karnataka Congress president DK Shivakumar will contest from the Kanakapura constituency.

In a press conference held at Plenary Hall, Vigyan Bhawan in the national capital, Chief Election Commissioner of India (CEC) Rajiv Kumar said that the focus will be on conducting a free, fair, inclusive and transparent elections in the state.

The Karnataka assembly currently has 121 MLAs of the ruling BJP, while Congress has 70 and its ally JD(S) has 30 seats.

The last assembly poll,held in May 2018 resulted in a hung assembly in Karnataka.

The BJP had emerged as the single-largest party with 104 seats but Congress and JD-S formed a post-poll coalition with 80 and 37 seats respectively and formed the government with Kumaraswamy as the Chief Minister.

In July 2019, the Congress-JD(S) alliance collapsed after several MLAs resigned from their parties and joined the BJP. The safforn party then formed the government with BS Yediyurappa as the Chief Minister. He resigned in July 2021 and was replaced by Bommai.