Bengaluru, DHNS: The Congress and the BJP won all the seats they contested in the Legislative Council polls from the Assembly constituencies held on Friday. The JD(S) won a seat but suffered humiliation as five MLAs cross voted.

All four Congress candidates emerged victorious, while the BJP managed to win two seats with the help of independents and smaller parties. Fourteen of the 15 independents appear to have cast their votes for the BJP, ensuring the victory of the party’s second candidate.

JD(S) leader Zameer Ahmed Khan and four others had earlier said that they would be voting for the Congress. Besides, votes of two MLAs were invalid–one that was cast for the JD(S) and another for the Congress.

The election held in Vidhana Soudha witnessed 100% turnout with all 225 MLAs, including the Speaker and a nominated member, exercising their franchise. The Congress candidates–Allam Veerabhadrappa, Veena Achaiah, R?B?Thimmapur, Rizwan Arshad–won comfortably crossing the minimum 29 votes mark. In all, the Congress candidates got 130 votes, five more than its total number of MLAs.

The best performance was by the BJP. The party, with just 44 MLAs, managed to get both its first and second candidates–V?Somanna and Lehar Singh–elected with the apparent support of independents and four smaller parties. While former minister Somanna got 31 votes, Singh got 27 first preference votes. At the end of the first round of counting, the second preference votes allotted to Somanna were considered and 25 of the 31 votes were found to be valid (all allotted to Singh).

As per a formula, on conversion this amounts to three first preference votes helping Singh cross the minimum votes required to get elected. In all, as many as 14 non-BJP?MLAs, other than those from the Congress, voted for the saffron outfit. The JD(S)’s?first candidate K?V?Narayanaswamy got elected by securing 30 votes.

However, the JD(S)’s second candidate S?M?Venkatpathi secured only five votes.