The 'most unsuccessful candidate' with a penchant for polls

HUBLI: He has found a slot as the " Most Unsuccessful Candidate" in the ' Limca Book of Records' fielding himself against political bigwigs in the past but this time his attempt to even enter the fray has failed.

Dr K Padmarajan wanted to contest against Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar as an independent from Hubli-Dharwad central constituency for the May five Karnataka Assembly polls, but his papers were rejected as he was not listed among the voters in the constituency.

Padmarajan, who had made attempts to contest against Presidents Pranab Mukherjee, Pratibha Patil, K R Narayanan and A P J Abdul Kalam, is a practicing doctor and had filed his 146th nomination to give a challenge to Shettar.

Since 1988, he has taken on 24 Lok Sabha members, 28 Rajya Sabha members and 46 MLAs.

Padmarajan claimed he files nominations against big personalities only to spread awareness about corruption. "My aim is to give corruption-free administration if I am elected," he added.

Padmarajan said the late Kaka Joginder Singh of Shyamganj was his inspiration, after the Uttar Pradesh man stormed into the Limca Book for contesting as many as 300 elections since 1952 and losing every one of them.

Padmarajan said "The highest votes I got was when I secured 6,273 votes in the Assembly elections from Mettur (Tamil Nadu) constituency in 2011."

Padmarajan, who runs a tyre retreading business at Mettur, said that he had so far lost Rs. 12 lakh in deposit money but would not stop filing nomination papers.

In 1996, he filed nominations for five Lok Sabha seats and three Assembly seats in five states against late Prime Minister Narasimha Rao in Nandyal, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa in Bargur, M O H Farook in Pondicherry and T Govindan of the CPI (M) in Kasaragod.

"After that, the Constitution was amended restricting a candidate from filing in not more than two constituencies. I must take the credit for that," he quipped.