Hectic parleys before polling for fourth RS seat in K’taka

BENGALURU: Hectic political deliberations are underway in Karnataka over the fate of the fourth Rajya Sabha seat from the southern state. The three major parties in the state are short of the votes to get their candidates elected for the fourth seat.

The JD(S), which is short of 13 votes, has been signalling the Congress to support their candidate. However, the national party has decided to field a second candidate for the seat.

In Karnataka, four Rajya Sabha seats are up for grabs. Each party requires 45 votes to get one candidate elected. The BJP, which has 122 MLAs in the state assembly, including independents, has already fielded two candidates -- union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman and actor Jaggesh.

The party can get the two elected without any problem. After this, the BJP will be left with 32 seats, which is 13 short of the required number to elect the third candidate.

However, the BJP has fielded outgoing Member of Legislative Council Lahar Singh as their third candidate.

The Congress on the other hand has 70 seats in the assembly and this ensures the victory of their candidate Jaiaram Ramesh. The party is then left with 25 seats, which is 20 short to get their second candidate Mansoor Khan elected. Khan is the son of former Union minister and ex-deputy chairman of RS, K Rahman Khan, and a co-founder of Delhi Public School, Bangalore. JD(S) has 32 MLAs in the assembly and it is short of 13 votes to get its candidate elected. Even though they don’t have enough votes, they have fielded Kupendra Reddy, a real estate baron, as their candidate. “There are 4-5 disgruntled MLAs, who have maintained a distance from the party in the last few months and the party fears that there might be cross-voting,” said a senior JD(S) eader on the condition of anonymity.

JD(S) state president CM Ibrahim alleged the Congress backtracked from the decision to support his party’s candidate. He said JD(S) fielded its candidate after the party supremo HD Deve Gowda spoke to Congress leader Sonia Gandhi. “We decided to field Kupendra Reddy as our candidate three days back. Deve Gowda had personally spoken to Sonia Gandhi. Kupendra Reddy had spoken to RV Deshpande and Mallikarjun Kharge. After everyone’s approval we decided to nominate our candidate,” he told reporters.

Former JD(S) minister HD Revanna too blamed the Congress for fielding a second candidate. “We had formed the government with Congress to keep the communal party away from power, but they have nominated their second candidate. Kumaraswamy had spoken to KC Venugopal and after that, we had fielded our candidate,” Revanna said.

The JD(S) now accused the Congress of using a Muslim face for political vendetta. Ibrahim said the Congress has fielded a Muslim candidate despite knowing that he would lose, adding that it is an insult to the Muslim community.

However, the Congress claimed that it is the JD(S) that is working against the Muslim community. If JD(S) refuses to support Khan, it will send across a wrong message among Muslim voters that the party is not as secular as it claims to be. Recently, Ibrahim was poached by the JD(S) from the Congress and made the party’s state president to appeal to the Muslim vote bank in the state.

Meanwhile, Opposition leader in Karnataka legislative council BK Hariprasad demanded that the JD(S) release “the agreement” if there was any. “If JD(S) has any agreement on what they are alleging, they can release it. Last time, we had not fielded our candidate as Deve Gowda was contesting. JD(S) must support our candidate this time. They must vote for a minority candidate if they believe in secular principles,” he said.

According to JD( S) party insiders, the regional party is hoping to get support from the Congress and former CM Kumaraswamy who is in Singapore is in touch with the party high command of the Congress. “We have not looked at BJP as an option yet and the BJP too has filed a candidate, so they have made their intentions clear. There is a lot at stake here. We supported Congress when they needed to bring down BJP. If we are ignored like this, it will have consequences when they need us in the future,” said the JD(S) leader. He also accused the Congress of eyeing the support of 4-5 disgruntled JD(S) MLAs, saying it won’t help Congress.

KPCC president DK Shivakumar on Monday said that talks are on with the JD(S). However, party insiders said that Congress’s decision to checkmate the JD(S) was evident in Shivakumar’s statement as well. “We have our own calculations,” Shivakumar told reporters on fielding Khan as the party’s second candidate.