Udupi, May 11: The Kaup Assembly constituency lies to the south of Udupi district. It has a beautiful beach with a 34-metre high lighthouse, built by the British in 1901, facing the Arabian Sea.

Women voters outnumber men in this constituency. Of the 1,37,360 voters, 74,680 are women and 62,680 men.

Owing to the delimitation, six villages from the erstwhile Brahmavar constituency, done away with during delimitation, and 12 villages from Udupi constituency, have been added to Kaup. Six villages from Kaup Assembly constituency have been transferred to the neighbouring Karkala Assembly constituency.

The addition of 12 villages from Udupi is said to be beneficial to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and that of six villages from Brahmavar to the Congress. But the six villages taken away from Udupi and added to Karkala is said to affect the Congress.

The 1,015 MW coal-based thermal power project taken up by the Udupi Power Corporation Ltd, formerly Nagarjuna Power Corporation Ltd, at Yellur village forms part of this constituency. The Congress has fielded Vasanth V. Salian for this Assembly seat, who represented it from 1983 to 2004 by winning the polls for five times in a row. His winning streak was brought to an end by the BJP candidate Lalaji R. Mendon in 2004.

Janata Dal (S) candidate Leeladhar Shetty, Samajwadi Party’s Karunakar Prabhu, Bahujan Samaj Party’s Steven John Menezes, Tulu film actor Gururaj Bhat alias Surya, and Nagesh Rao (both independents), are also in the fray here.

A keen contest is on the cards between Mr. Salian and Mr. Mendon.

Hindu