Famous for its wooden toys, Channapatna Assembly constituency of Karnataka Assembly is one of the constituencies located in the Ramanagara district, and is a part of the Bangalore Rural Lok Sabha constituency, along with eight other assembly constituencies.
Channapatna Assembly constituency is witnessing a close fight between HD Kumaraswamy of the Janata Dal (Secular) and Bharatiya Janata Party leader CP Yogeshwara. Gangadhar S is contesting from the Indian National Congress (INC). Channapatna constituency was represented by Yogeshwara as an Independent candidate in 1999. Later, he won the seat as a Congress candidate in the 2004 and 2008 assembly elections.
After joining the BJP during the infamous Operation Lotus, a term coined in 2008, Yogeshwara secured support from legislators bypassing the anti-defection law, so as to take the BJP past the majority number, Yogeshwara lost the by-election in 2009 against JD (S) candidate Ashwath M.C. He won the seat in the 2011 bypoll as a BJP candidate. In 2013, he contested on a Samajwadi Party (SP) ticket and won against Kumaraswamy’s wife Anita Kumaraswamy. He got 80,099 votes while Anita polled 73,635 votes.
In the 2018 assembly elections, Yogeshwara, who has also acted in films and has faced several corruption allegations in the past, contested on a BJP ticket. He was defeated by Kumaraswamy, who polled 87,995 votes while Yogeshwara managed to get 66,465 votes.
Channapatna, which voted Congress candidates to power, has become a bastion of the JD (S). People in Channapatna have a special bond with the Devegowda (Kumaraswamy’s father) family. Kumaraswamy has done a lot of work in the constituency such as building new schools, colleges and asphalt roads
Out of 224 seats in the Karnataka Assembly, the winning party must have at least 113 seats from the government in Karnataka.
Karnataka’s 224-member Legislative Assembly polls are currently underway; the results of the crucial elections will be announced on May 13.