TUMAKURU: Kunchatiga-Vokkaliga seer Nanjavadhuta Swami, who is the head of Spatikapuri at Pattanayakanahalli in Sira, seems to have played a major role in the Sira and Rajarajeshwari Nagar Assembly bypolls, where voting took place on Tuesday.
But facing a dilemma, or dharma sankata if you may, as all the three candidates from the three major political parties — Dr Rajesh Gowda (BJP), T B Jayachandra (Congress) and Ammajamma (JDS) — belong to the Kunchatiga-Vokkaliga community, he absented himself from voting. He returned to the mutt only around 7 pm, an hour after the polling ended. In the last Assembly election in 2018, he had backed late B Sathyanarayana from the JDS, who went on to win the election.
The seer has been a vocal exponent of the Vokkaliga cause and has backed leaders from the community, irrespective of their political affiliations. When D V Sadananda Gowda of the BJP was removed as chief minister in 2012, he had hit the streets.
When KPCC president D K Shivakumar was raided recently by the CBI, the Swamiji met the Congress leader and expressed his solidarity with him. Just a few days ahead of the Rajarajeshwari Nagar bypoll, Congress candidate H Kusuma, wife of deceased IA S officer D K Ravi, and Shivakumar met the seer.
The meeting may have stopped the migration of some of community votes to BJP in this bypoll, said Puttalingaiah, an analyst. In the first few days of electioneering in Sira, BJP state vice-president B Y Vijayendra too met the Swamiji to influence the voter base.
The community voters are not averse to the BJP as they played a big role in electing saffron party candidates in the 2018 Assembly and 2019 Lok Sabha elections from Tumakuru. “Kunchatigas have, by and large, gone against the BJP in the Sira Assembly constituency and elected either the JDS or Congress candidates over the years.
ZThis time, a large percentage of Ahinda votes may have gone in favour of Congress candidate Jayachandra,” said Chitthanna, a Kadugolla community leader in Sira. Former Advocate-General Prof Raviverma Kumar said Jayachandra was the natural choice for Kunchatigas as he had favoured officers from his own community in his entire career.