BENGALURU: JDS supremo HD Deve Gowda seems determined to hold on to every Vokkaliga vote in the old Mysuru region following a string of defeats for the party even in the community bastion since the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
On Friday the 88-year-old patriarch, who hit the campaign trail for the December 10 Council polls in the Vokkaliga bastion of Tumakuru, called on the head of a Kunchitiga Vokkaliga Mutt, Sri Hanumanthanatha Swami, at Elerampura in Koratagere taluk. He covered the community’s strong bastions — Koratagere, Madhugiri and Sira taluks — in a hectic 12-hour schedule.
Gowda had lost the 2019 Lok Sabha polls from Tumakuru as the BJP had managed to divide the Kunchitiga Vokkaliga community votes and won the seat. The saffron party continued its winning streak as Kunchitiga Vokkaliga leaders Dr C M Rajesh Gowda won the Sira bypolls and Chidananda Gowda won the Council seat from the South East Graduates’ constituency.
For the upcoming Council polls in Tumakuru, the BJP has fielded N Lokesh, another Kunchitiga Vokkaliga leader. The JDS nominee Anil Kumar and Congress party’s R Rajendra hail from ST Nayaka community. While Gowda is doing everything to keep the party afloat, second rung leaders want to avenge his 2019 defeat. Then, rebel Congress leader K N Rajanna had openly supported BJP candidate G S Basavaraju and helped him defeat Gowda. Now, since Rajanna’s son Rajendra is in the fray, local JDS leaders want to pay him back in the same coin.
“Though running high fever, I had campaigned for Rajanna in the 2004 Assembly polls from the erstwhile Bellavi seat and ensured his victory as he was the JDS candidate,” Gowda recalled. “The people may have let me down in 2019, but now they have a chance to lift my spirits by electing our party candidate in the Council polls,” he hoped.
The JDS had also lost the Mandya Lok Sabha seat followed by the Assembly seats of K R Pet and Sira in the bypolls, all in the Vokkaliga stronghold. After the latest debacle in the Sindhagi and Hanagal bypolls, where the party has no base, the JDS has restricted itself to only six Council seats — Hassan, Mandya, Tumakuru, Mysuru-Chamarajanagar, Bengaluru Rural and Kolar. The party leadership withdrew H U Ishaq from the Kodagu seat where it has no base.