Bengaluru, Apr 23 (FN Agency) Karnataka Congress President DK Shivakumar on Saturday alleged that BJP legal team and Chief Minister’s Office are trying to use the office of the election commission to disqualify the candidates of the Congress from contesting the May 10 assembly elections in the state. “BJP legal team and Chief Minister’s Office are trying everything to make sure Congress candidates nominations’ are disqualified,” he told reporters here.Shivakumar also requested the Election Commission of India to collect the call register of the Chief Minister as he did the same in Savadatti by himself calling up the officials. The KPCC Chief alleged that the CMO is involved in malpractices, and asked the returning officials to accept the application of their party candidates. These remarks came after BJP leader and Union Minister Shobha Karandlaje had lodged a complaint with the EC alleging that Shivakumar accepted bribes from candidates to give them tickets to contest the upcoming election. Shivakumar alleged that the nominations of the BJP candidates, which have the potential of being rejected are being put on abeyance.He also alleged that attempts were made to disqualify his application too.
“Calls are being made from CMO to the Returning Officer and Congress candidates are being disqualified, applications of some BJP candidates need to be rejected, but are put on hold,” he said. “They also acted in my case even after I filed nominations many times. They tried to disqualify my application also,” Shivakumar said. The Election Commission had on Friday accepted the nomination of Shivakumar for the Kanakapura assembly constituency. Earlier on Thursday, Shivakumar’s brother and Congress MP from Bengaluru Rural DK Suresh had filed nomination from Kanakapura as a precaution in case the nomination of Shivakumar got rejected. The development came even as the Karnataka High Court rejected Shivakumar’s plea challenging the state government’s permission to the CBI to prosecute him in a disproportionate assets case. Meanwhile, Shivakumar also dismissed Karandlaje’s allegations that he accepted bribes while issuing B-Forms to his party candidates before filing election nominations. She alleged that the Congress leader had violated the poll norms and action should be taken against him.