Muslim votes always plays a decisive role during elections
e.g. in Shimoga 2013 Assembly Election total polled was 139648 votes and out of which electorates voted as below
Prasanna Kumar K.B.(Congress) 39355 28.18%
S.Rudregowda (KJP - Rebel of BJP) 39077 27.98%
K.S. Eswarappa (BJP) 33462 23.96%
M.Srikanth (JDS) 21638 15.49%
http://www.empoweringindia.org/new/constituency.aspx?eid=943&cid=113
If BJP & KJP has faced election united then they could have got around 70k votes and there by could have won just like in 2008 but since voter was in confusion Congress MLA got better of them by 250 votes and won the election and for record Islam is second most popular religion in city of Shimoga with approximately 23.93 % and Hinduism is majority religion in Shimoga city with 72.76 %.
http://www.census2011.co.in/census/city/443-shimoga.html