VIJAYAPURA: Looking at the political history of BJP MP Ramesh Jigajinagi of the Vijayapura SC reserved constituency, who has won every Lok Sabha election he has contested, many people humorously say Jigajinagi’s destiny has not been written by God, but Jigajinagi himself.
Jigajinagi is one of those rare politicians who has kept winning despite facing severe criticism over not taking up any significant development works.
Having achieved a hat-trick of winning Parliamentary elections from the Chikkodi Lok Sabha constituency in Belagavi district, he contested for the first time from Vijayapura in 2009 when the seat was reserved for Scheduled Caste.
A staunch follower of former chief minister late Ramakrishna Hegde, he was part of the parties floated by the leader. After his demise, Jigajinagi joined BJP.
In Vijayapura, he first contested the Lok Sabha election on a BJP ticket against Congress candiate Prakash Rathod. Despite the strong presence of Congress in the district, he won by a margin of 42,404 votes.
In 2014, the luck turned in his favour again as he rode the ‘Modi Wave’ to victory by again defeating Rathod, who had been given the ticket the second time by Congress. Then, he won by a margin of 69,819 votes.
He became Minister of State of Rural Drinking Water and Sanitation in the Modi ministry. He won the last LS polls by defeating Sunita Chavan, who was the Congress-JDS alliance candidate. It was a hat-trick and he won by a margin of whopping 2,58,038 votes.
Challenges to Jigajinagi
Now, as he faces his fourth Lok Sabha election, it may not be easy for him to win this time. Congress’ Raju Algur, a Dalit, belongs to the Chalavadi sect, which has over 2 lakh voters. Jigajinagi belongs to the Madiga sect that has roughly 30,000 votes.
In the last three LS polls, Jigajinagi faced only Lambani candidates, and both sects of the Dalit community largely voted for him. But this time, a major chunk of Chalavadi votes may shift to Algur. Besides, Congress being in power in the state and six of the eight MLAs in Vijayapura district being Congress leaders could help Algur.
Development, a mirage
The district, meanwhile, has been facing several development issues. Activists and historians, like Krishna Kolhar Kulkarni, have expressed displeasure over successive governments not giving much impetus to the tourism sector in the district which has enormous potential to increase revenue and employment. As the district has no major industries that generate employment for a large number of youth, Jigajinagi himself had announced setting up of a mega fertiliser production unit but it never materialised. Despite Vijayapura being the highest grower of lemon and grapes in the state, it does not have adequate cold storage or processing units for the two horticulture crops.