Karnataka polls: SC dismisses mining baron Janardhan Reddy's plea to enter Bellary for campaigning

The Supreme Court today dismissed a plea of mining baron and BJP leader G Janardhana Reddy seeking permission to enter Bellary district in Karnataka for electioneering.

A bench of Justices A K Sikri and Ashok Bhushan junked his plea to enter the district to campaign for his brother, G Somashekar Reddy, who is a BJP candidate in the upcoming assembly elections in Karnataka. In 2009, Janardhana Reddy was sent to jail for being involved in illegal mining of iron ore in Bellary and Anantapur in Andhra Pradesh. He was granted bail by the apex court in January 2015.

Hitting back at the Prime Minister for his "2+1 formula" jibe at him, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said Narendra Modi's formula to win the assembly election in the state is "2 Reddys + 1 Yeddy". " Responding to Modi's attack at an election rally earlier in the day on him contesting from two constituencies "with fear of losing""and also over fielding his son for the May 12 polls, he also pointed out that the PM had contested from two seats during 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

"Attacking Modi over BJP fielding brothers of tainted mining baron G Janrdhan Reddy in the assembly elections, the Chief Minister said "2 Reddys + 1 Yeddy was Modi's formula to win election." "Today PM avoided talking about his complicity in"closing CBI cases against the Reddy bros. Instead he spoke"about some 2+1 formula. Here is the explanation to his formula"to win election. 2 Reddys + 1 Yeddy. #2Reddy1Yeddy""he said in another tweet.'Yeddy' is a reference to BJP's chief ministerial candidate B S Yeddyurappa.

Pointing out that even Modi contested from two" constituencies -- Varanasi and Vadodara -- in the 2014 Lok Sabha"elections, the Chief Minister told the Prime Minister to worry about his party not crossing 60-70 seats.