The Hassan assembly seat is located in Hassan district and is one of the Hassan Parliament seat’s eight assembly divisions. The constituency will see Preetham J Gowda of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) up against Banavasi Rangaswamy of the Indian National Congress (INC), Swaroop H S Prakash of the Janata Dal (Secular), and Agile Yogish of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
Preetham beat Prakash by a margin of 13,006 votes in 2018. Preetham won the seat with a vote margin of 63,348 votes while Prakash finished second with a vote margin of 50,342. HK Mahesh of the Congress was at third position garnering a total of 38,101 votes.
Hassan district, which is agriculture-oriented, is dominated by Vokkaligas, Muslims, SCs and OBCs, while there is a small presence of Lingayats.
As a first-time MLA, Preetham helped people during Covid 19, built houses at Siddaiah Nagar slum, and ensured new underground drainage lines and concrete roads were laid.
HD Deve Gowda, a powerful leader of the Vokkalliga community and the national president of JD(S), started his political career from the Holenarasipura Assembly segment. Over the years, he has built a formidable political base, earlier for Janata Party and now for JDS, in Hassan district. While six constituencies in the district have JDS MLAs, the Hassan constituency is represented by BJP’s Preetham.
Despite poor health, the former prime minister, who recently turned 90, took out a rally in the constituency seeking votes for party candidate Swaroop.
Both Preetham and Swaroop hail from the Dasa Vokkaliga sub-sect, while Deve Gowda is a Mullu Vokkaliga.
As of 2019 Lok Sabha election, the total number of voters in the Hassan Assembly stands at 2,16,287. According to the 2011 Census, SC voters at the Hassan Assembly are approximately 25,781 which is around 11.92 per cent, while ST voters are approximately 2,725 which is around 1.26 per cent. Muslim voters at the Athani assembly are approximately 35,038 which is around 16.2% as per voter list analysis.
Out of 224 seats in the Karnataka Assembly, the winning party must have at least 113 seats to form the government in Karnataka.
Polling to elect the 16th Karnataka Legislative Assembly began on Wednesday morning at 7 am amid tight security arrangements. Voting will continue till 6 pm and 20.99% voter turnout was recorded at 11 am in the southern state, informed the Election Commission.
The results for the high-stake polls will be declared on May 13.