Kharge elected new Cong prez: A timeline of his many electoral victories and a loss

New Delhi, Oct 19: Mallikarjun Kharge has been elected the Congress president on Wednesday. He defeated Shashi Tharoor in an electoral contest, the sixth in the party's 137-year-old history.

Congress' central election authority chairman Madhusudan Mistry announced after the counting of votes that of the 9,385 votes polled in the Congress president poll, Kharge got 7,897 votes and Shashi Tharoor 1,072 votes, while 416 votes were declared invalid.

Being the son of a a poor mill worker and losing his mother at the age of six, Kharge's journey in politics has never been a bed of roses. Yet he created a sort of history by winning 10 consecutive elections. The only election he lost was in 2019 Lok Sabha election in Gulbarga against BJP's Umesh Jadhav.

Here is the timeline of his journey in politics:

Positions held by Kharge:

• 1973: Appointed the Chairman of the Octroi Abolition Committee.
• 1974: Appointed the Chairman of state-owned Leather Development Corporation.
• 1978: Appointed Minister of State for Rural Development and Panchayat Raj.
• 1980: Became the Minister for Revenue in the Gundu Rao Cabinet.
• 1985: Appointed the Deputy Leader of the Opposition in the Karnataka Assembly.
• 1992-1994: He was the Minister for Co-operation, Medium and Large Industries.
• 1999: Minister for Home.
• 2004: Minister for Transport and Water Resources.
• 2005: President of the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee.
• 2008: Leader of the Opposition.
• 2014: Appointed the Leader of the Congress party in the Lok Sabha.
• 2020: Elected (unopposed) to the Rajya Sabha from Karnataka.
• 2021: Appointed Leader of Opposition, Rajya Sabha.
• 2022: He resigned to the post of LoP for contesting Congress party presidential post.