BENGALURU: Union Minister of Steel and Heavy Industries HD Kumaraswamy is juggling between two responsibilities of reorganising, JDS -- of which he is the state president, by seeking the support of the Vokkaliga community and taking different communities into confidence to help the regional party in the future.
He and his son Nikhil Kumaraswamy, who is likely to take over the state party chief’s position, visited Kunchatiga-Vokkaliga religious head Sri Nanjavadhuta Swami at Pattanayakanahalli in Sira taluk and Lingayat seer Sri Siddalinga Swamiji at Siddaganga Mutt in Tumakuru on Monday.
During the visit, he promised Kunchatiga-Vokkaligas the OBC tag in the Centre’s list of castes, and the Scheduled Tribe recognition for Kadugollas. “I will convince Prime Minister Narendra Modi to do the reclassification,” he asserted.
On Sunday, Kumaraswamy met Vokkaliga seer of the Adichunchanagiri Mutt, Sri Nirmalanandanatha Swami. Vokkaligas, including members of the subsect Kunchatiga Vokkaligas, are said to have backed JDS and also its alliance partner BJP in the recent Lok Sabha elections. A combination of Vokkaligas, Lingayats and, to some extent, Kadugollas had worked in favour of the BJP-JDS alliance in the Old Mysuru region, including Mandya, Kolar, Chitradurga, Tumakuru and Bengaluru Rural.
Now, Kumaraswamy wants to keep up the momentum to make JDS a force to reckon with, keeping in view future elections, political analysts said. “JDS had lost the confidence of Veerashaiva-Lingayats when Kumaraswamy, in 2007, refused to honour the alliance agreement with BJP and did not transfer power to BS Yediyurappa. A section of Vokkaligas too had distanced itself from the party as DK Shivakumar had emerged as an alternative leader of the community. Now, Kumaraswamy is trying to regain the trust of the two numerically strong communities,” they observed.
Talking to reporters at Tumakuru, Kumaraswamy rubbished opposition Congress’ suspicion that electronic voting machines had been rigged in the recent Lok Sabha elections and called the allegations baseless. “Did Congress win 136 seats in the last Assembly polls by hacking EVMs,” he asked.
On increasing the prices of fuel when he was chief minister, which was pointed out by incumbent CM Siddaramaiah, he said, “I had tried to mobilise Rs 25,000 crore to waive off farm loans, but Siddaramaiah did not let me do it.” Kumaraswamy said he is focusing on types of industries that can be invited to set up plants in Karnataka. “There was a long-standing demand that jobs should be given to locals which will be taken care of by convincing industrialists,” he said.