5 august 2019 http://www.openthemagazine.com 37
rebel MlAs, including Pratap gowda Patil, a former yediyurappa
loyalist who won from Maski on a Congress ticket by 213 votes,
and actor-politician BC Patil from Hirekerur, had scraped by with
slender margins in the 2018 Assembly elections.
Holed up in a hotel in Mumbai, rebel legislators repeatedly in-
voked their disenchantment with the government to justify their
desertion. The word ‘interference’ was often used in connection
with the state Congress and Jd(S) top brass. indeed, it has emerged
as the trigger for the resignation of senior leaders like r ramalinga
reddy, the BTM layout MlA, who cited differences with deputy
Chief Minister and in-charge of Bengaluru g Parameshwara.
Though reddy eventually returned to support the government
in the trust vote, the damage had been done. His dissent embold-
ened other MlAs—Basavaraju, Munirathna, ST Somashekhar
and MTB nagaraj—from the Congress stronghold of Bengaluru
to break away. They had all complained of ‘internal problems’
emanating from the high-handedness of the top leaders of the
coalition, especially Parameshwara and Public Works Minister
and brother of Chief Minister Hd Kumaraswamy, Hd revanna.
While wads of cash may or may not have eased their journey
across the aisle, there can be little doubt that the rebels—13 from
the Congress, three from the Jd(S), two independents and the lone
Bahujan Samaj Party MlA—felt compelled to withdraw support.
AH vishwanath, a four-time MlA and Kuruba leader who was
made Jd(S) state president a year ago and resigned after the lok
Sabha polls assuming responsibility for the party’s poor show,
abandoned ship reportedly because he felt sidelined in a rapidly
shrinking party. His exit, along with that of narayana gowda,
the Krishnarajpet MlA who said he was forced to resign because
of constant interference from former Prime Minister Hd deve
gowda’s family, leaves a gaping hole in the Jd(S) bastion of Mysore-
Mandya. up north in Bombay-Karnataka, ramesh Jarkiholi, the
gokak MlA and a powerful sugar baron who was dropped from
the Kumaraswamy Cabinet in december, had been working to
engineer a defection in the Congress for months. Shivakumar’s in-
terference in local politics in Belgaum was reportedly the last straw.
“This is a wake-up call for parties pitted against the BJP,” says
psephologist Sandeep Shastri. “The BJP has, of course, fished in
troubled waters, but the disarray in the Congress national leader-ship after the lok Sabha elections and the fact that the Karnataka
alliance was filled with untenable contradictions paved the way
for the BJP’s eventual victory in the state.”
in a heart-on-his-sleeve farewell speech ahead of the trust
vote, the outgoing chief minister peddled the tired trope of the
wronged, self-effacing politician and launched a screed against
political poaching and the threat to democracy that it posed. He
closed, however, with a practical warning to the BJP: if the party,
which now enjoyed a frail majority, rushed to stake claim to
form a government, a hostage situation may soon repeat itself.
Stability may well be the unobtainium of Karnataka politics, but
the BJP sees pure potential in uprooting the Congress from the
state. “Many years ago, a weed began to sprout all over the lawns
of Bangalore. it was so rampant and vile that people were paid
per kilogramme for uprooting it. That weed was called Congress
grass,” says a senior BJP leader. “it is time to employ the same strat-
egy in politics.” nBS YediYurappa,
The 76-Year-Old STaTe BJp
preSidenT, maY finallY B e
aBle TO puT The ignOminY
Of hiS 55-hOur STinT aS
Chief miniSTer laST Y ear
Behind him