The people of Karnataka are giving a tough fight to politicians this election, making it almost impossible to read their mind. That’s a good sign for a democracy. In a tough electoral contest with no clear favourites, as is the case in Karnataka this time around, it’s the voter who wins as parties are made to fight, pray and plead for every single vote. And that’s when every vote truly counts.
The May 12 Assembly election should have been a dull affair, considering that there is no single big issue that matters to all, no scandals to spice up the contest and there aren’t even exciting fresh faces among the contenders to rally the voters around. But, these are exactly the reasons why this election has turned out to be one of the most interesting. In the absence of a big issue, every issue is big. In the absence of major scandals, people see scandals everywhere and, in the absence of new faces, the old ones offer new hope.
This election is interesting also because it has the attention of the whole country, with political pundits billing it as a contest that could set the tone for the big fight in 2019 and one that could decide the fortunes of two main rivals in India’s political space – the Congress and the BJP. But that’s what the experts think. The voters, at least a majority of them, don’t think that far ahead. Away from the Modi versus Rahul debate, Siddaramaiah versus Yeddyurappa fight and Hindutva versus Secular narrative, this election is being fought at a very local level, and over issues that are mostly local in nature.
That is because the big issues that were supposed to be deciding factors in the polls have turned out to be of limited impact. One such is the Congress government’s decision to accord separate religion status to Lingayats. It does not seem to have yielded desired results for the party, so much so that no one in the Congress is even talking about it.
Another is the BJP’s efforts to paint Siddaramaiah as an anti-Hindu figure. It might have struck a chord in coastal Karnataka and in pockets elsewhere, but the plot seems to have been not so effective in consolidating Hindu votes in the BJP’s favour. Even issues like Kannada pride, inter-state water disputes, farm distress, law and order, politics of populism and appeasement, and corruption are part of the campaign noise and could make a difference but their impact seems to be limited.
So, while on one hand it’s a contest between three big parties (Congress, BJP and JD-S), three chief ministerial candidates (Siddaramaiah, Yeddyurappa and Kumaraswamy) and two national leaders (Narendra Modi and Rahul Gandhi), on the other it’s also about the candidates in each constituency and the local political and caste dynamics, with emotional factors working either for or against parties and candidates too coming into the picture.
According to an estimation, about 90 of the 223 seats (election for one seat has been put off due to the death of a BJP candidate) are witnessing neck and neck contests with absolutely no way to pick a winner at this point of time. While most opinion polls have predicted a hung verdict, the Congress still seems to have a slight edge on account of there being no perceivable anti-incumbency factor in play and also because the BJP and the JD(S) have nothing better to offer in terms of an alternative. Ground reports suggest the BJP will do better than the last time, but it remains to be seen if that’s good enough.
The outcome could be so close that of the three chief ministerial candidates, one with the least number of seats may actually get to occupy the post. Sensing the emerging situation, more chief ministerial candidates have appeared in the Congress. While state Congress chief G Parameshwara has said he, along with Mallikarjun Kharge and K H Muniyappa, is in the race, former Congress leader Sushil Kumar Shinde has said Kharge should be considered for the job.
Their claim to the throne should not be taken lightly for, in the event that the Congress has to join hands with the JD(S) post elections, all of them and more stand a chance. The significance that Congress and BJP have attached to the Karnataka election is evident from the high-pitched high-profile campaign they unleashed in the last few days. While Rahul Gandhi has toured the state extensively, Modi would have addressed 21 big rallies by the time the campaigning ends on May 10. And this number does not include the rallies he held before the election schedule was announced. Both the parties have also deployed a large number of central leaders, most of them clueless as to the ground situation and what is expected of them but are going around addressing voters in a desperate but futile effort to make sense of the contest.
The big rallies are having no better impact than enthusing party workers and supporters, whose loyalty and votes are already guaranteed. They are unlikely to sway the undecided voter as this election, to a large extent, is not about Modi, Rahul or national issues. It is about the state of Karnataka and many Karnatakas within. The outcome will depend on how many come out to vote and who. In the end, people will make sure that every vote will count.
Kiran Prakash
Resident Editor, Karnataka
Email: kiranprakash@newindianexpress.com