Karnataka Assembly Election Result 2018: Congress' DK Shivakumar says Siddaramaiah was 'over-confident'

Bengaluru: Blaming Siddaramaiah for his “over-confidence”, Karnataka energy minister DK Shivakumar on Tuesday said that the outgoing chief minister was advised against contesting from two seats but he still went ahead. [caption id=“attachment_3884689” align=“alignleft” width=“300”]  File image of Karnataka power minister DK Shivakumar. Image courtesy: Facebook[/caption] He said the Congress did not do even 10 percent of what the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) did during the campaigning. “Rahul Gandhi (Congress president) did his best to come here and campaign in the state in the past three months. But it is not a good sign for the local leaders, who could not gauge the trend in their own constituencies,” said Shivakumar. Siddaramaiah decided to contest from the Badami and Chamundeshwari seats as he felt he knew the constituencies well even as he was “advised internally against doing so,” he said. Asked if it was Siddaramaiah’s “over-confidence”, Shivakumar said: “Sure…It is his confidence which has taken (us down) to this level.” The outgoing chief minister lost from the Chamundeshwari constituency but has won a seat from Badami. Asked whether Siddaramaiah was trying to reach out to Janata Dal-Secular, when he said he was open to a Dalit chief minister, Shivakumar said the party was keeping a tab on the numbers. “It is only after looking at the final figures that we will take a call.” At the same time, he said the party was “definitely” open to reaching out to the JD(S). “Why not? We want BJP to remain out of power,” he said. Shivakumar also denied that there was any Modi wave in Karnataka, and said: “Our defects became their pluses.”