In the race for Karnataka's CM seat, Congress MLA RV Deshpande who is also one of the seniormost leader and has won in elections as many time as Kharge has won is not there. Deshpande (76) has won from Haliyal district. He has won the seat for 9 consecutive times equalling his no of winning to Kharge.
Deshpande (57,240 votes) won from the Haliyal seat by a margin of 3,623 votes against his nearest rival BJP's Sunil Hegade (53,617 votes).
He is a law graduate and seniormost MLA of the party in the state. Previously he was in Janata Parivar, later on he changed his side to Congress in 1999. From Janata Parivar he has won 4 times MLA seat.
In an interview with the before this year's elections he told that "Kharge and I have won assembly elections eight times. If I win this time, it will be a record in the House. Nobody has won nine times." When it was asked why he has been laying low and does not figure in the list of contenders for CM despite being the senior most, he said, "I am not laying low in a way because I am a very disciplined man. I am not in any race. ...there could be a desire for CM, but you should not fight for that."
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