Bengaluru: The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the opposition Congress shared equal honours by winning 11 seats each in the polls to the 25 Legislative Council seats in the biennial elections held from 20 Local Authorities Constituencies in the State, that took place on Dec. 10.

The counting of votes of all the 25 seats was taken up yesterday and according to the results, the BJP and the Congress won 11 seats each, while the JD(S) bagged two seats and Independent candidate won in one seat. After the results, the BJP has fallen short of one member for a majority in the 75-member Upper House.

A major upset for the BJP was the defeat of the party candidate Mahantesh Kavatagimath in the dual-member Belagavi seat, where Channaraj Hattiholi of the Congress and Independent candidate Lakhan Jarkiholi won.

Though the BJP initially looked like winning 12 seats after the counting began at 8 am yesterday, the last minute reversal in the dual-member Mysuru-Chamarajanagar seat, which saw JD(S) candidate C.N. Manjegowda inching ahead of his BJP rival Raghu R. Kautilya in the elimination round to win the second seat, resulted in the party falling one short of a majority  in the 75-member Legislative Council.

With yesterday’s results, BJP has 37 members, Congress-26, JD(S)-10, Independent-1 and Chairman-1, in the 75-member House. Prior to the elections, the House strength was — BJP-32, Congress – 29, JD(S) – 12, Independent – 1  and Chairman – 1.