BENGALURU: While JDS support to NDA presidential candidate Droupadi Murmu is a foregone conclusion pending a formal ratification, those close to Kupendra Reddy, who was the party candidate in the recently held Rajya Sabha polls, are wondering why the party could not work out a quid pro quo deal with BJP for extending support to Murmu and ensure his victory. With such a deal, BJP’s third candidate Lehar Singh Siroya would not have filed the nomination, allowing a smooth passage for Reddy, they said.
Asked if such a deal could have been worked out, Reddy said, “They could have done it.’’ On the party vacillating between BJP and Congress depending on situations, JDS state president CM Ibrahim said, “First, we have to keep in mind that we are a regional party. The other presidential candidate Yashwant Sinha visited Bengaluru. Did he come to us? No.
Murmu, who is sure of her victory, came to us. Then, who should we support? She comes from a very backward ST community too. Remember, this is a presidential election and the question of narrow party affiliations do not arise. We have called a meeting on July 13 and will take a decision on that day.” But Opposition leader in the Council BK Hariprasad said, “When JDS was part of the meeting at Mallikarjun Kharge’s residence, why did it support and ratify Yashwant Sinha’s candidature?”
Clarifying, president of the JDS Parliamentary Board HK Kumaraswamy said, “But Murmu had not been chosen as the candidate then. We decided to support her after realising that she was an ST from an extremely backward community. JDS has still not decided to support her. We have 32 MLAs, two MLAs in Kerala and a member each in the Rajya Sabha and Lok Sabha.”
Political analysts said JDS has long-term interests in backing Murmu. The party has enjoyed chief ministership twice, from 2006-2008 and again from 2018 to 2019. If the 2023 polls throw up a hung Assembly, JDS could ally with any party in power and in such an eventuality, access to the Rashtrapati Bhavan to get assent for bills and ordinances would be an added plus, they pointed out.