KARNATAKA VERDICT
H D KUMARASWAMY: FARMER’S SON WHO DIFFERED WITH BSY
+ BS YEDDYURAPPA: LINGAYAT STRONGMAN IN RACE FOR THE CHAIR + VAJUBHAI VALA: MODI CONFIDANT WILL TAKE A CALL
+ STATE’S ECONOMIC HEFT CRUCIAL FOR 2019 + PARTIES RACE TO BUILD NUMBERS
+ SONIA GANDHI’S CALL BROUGHT H D DEVE GOWDA ON BOARD
Mamata Banerjee must be given a reward for the most accurate political prophecy. A few hours before polling was about to start on May 12, she told a Bengali TV channel: “I think there will be a hung situation in Karnataka with Congress and BJP both getting seats that are comparable. The role of HD Deve Gowda will become crucial. He can win 28-30 seats. I think his son will become the next chief minister.”
So who is ‘his son’?
It was October 2007 and Rajnath Singh was president of the BJP. H D Deve Gowda’s Janata Dal Secular (JDS) with 56 members in the Legislative Assembly did not have the numbers to form a government. Deve Gowda was forced to do a deal with the devil - the BJP that had 79 MLAs in a House of 224. The arrangement was that Deve Gowda's son H D Kumaraswamy would rule for two-anda-half years, and then yield the chief ministership to the BJP’s B S Yeddyurappa, the then deputy chief minister. Kumaraswamy worked hard during his chief ministership: he tried to create a base through 2006, and local newspapers reported that he went to a Dalit colony near Mysore and stayed at the house of an “untouchable”.
But, when the time came for Kumaraswamy to hand over the mantle to Yeddyurappa, he changed his mind. The BJP withdrew support to the government. Now Deve Gowda turned to the Congress for help. But people like Siddaramaiah - they had abandoned Deve Gowda and did not want the Congress to have any dealings with him — and others demurred. Instead, they backed a rebellion by one of Deve Gowda's lieutenants MP Prakash. But the Congress dithered and lost valuable time. Finally, in 2007, the Kumaraswamy government fell and President's rule was imposed.
What was at the heart of the differences between Kumaraswamy and Yeddyurappa? Intense mutual antagonism, not only because the two belong to polar different castes — Kumaraswamy is a Vokkaliga, Yeddyurappa is a Lingayat — but also because neither wanted to take orders from the other. For instance, Yeddyurappa claimed that the idea of cards for those below the poverty line and subsidised bicycles to these cardholders was his idea. Kumaraswamy said it was actually his idea, but when he mooted it, it was turned down by Yeddyurappa.
In short, it isn’t easy to work with Kumaraswamy, especially when the BJP is watching every move beady-eyed. Karnataka is in for an extremely fraught five years.