Can BJP make inroads into Old Mysuru region?

Herculean task

Last week, Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa vowed on the floor of the Legislative Assembly that the BJP would win 135-140 seats in the 2023 Assembly election and the Congress will be made to sit in the Opposition for 10 years.

But, ask pundits or the BJP’s own poll managers and they will say that Yediyurappa’s goal will require the saffron party to win big in the Old Mysuru region. And this region has come to be a high wall the BJP has not managed to scale in years.

“Even our national president J P Nadda is aware of the situation,” BJP general secretary N Ravikumar said of the party’s difficulty in the Old Mysuru region. He conceded that the BJP’s organisational strength was not as strong as that of the Congress or the JD(S) in the region.

The Old Mysuru region is dominated by the Vokkaliga community and covers the geographies of Mysuru, Mandya, Hassan, Ramanagara, Chamarajanagar, Chikballapur and so on. The belt comprises some 60-odd assembly constituencies.

For years, the Congress and the JD(S) have fought bitter elections - their rivalry is the stuff of legend, with villages not seeing eye to eye based on their party affiliation - with the BJP nowhere in the picture.

But, in the high-voltage 2019 bypolls, the saffron party managed to win the KR Pet Assembly seat, its first victory in Mandya where the JD(S) holds sway. It also won Chikballapur, another first. In the 2018 polls, the BJP managed to win one seat in Hassan.

That the BJP lacked an organisational base is getting fixed and efforts are on for an aggressive push to make inroads in the region with every election. “The upcoming gram panchayat polls is an opportunity,” BJP’s Nanjangud legislator B Harshavardhan said. “We won very few taluk panchayat seats in Periyapatna, Hunur and HD Kote. There, too, we are improving organisationally,” he said.

The BJP is wary of the challenge posed by Congress’ D K Shivakumar, who represents the Vokkaliga machismo, whereas H D Deve Gowda of the JD(S) remains the community’s
tallest leader.

The BJP appears to be grooming its own crop of Vokkaliga leaders: Deputy Chief Minister C N Ashwath Narayan being put in charge of Ramanagara, the turf of Shivakumar and H D Kumaraswamy; Tourism Minister C T Ravi’s elevation as a national general secretary to name a few.

BJP vice-president B Y Vijayendra, Yediyurappa’s son and although a Lingayat, is emerging as a force to reckon with after his instrumental role in the KR Pet win. He is almost certain to contest the next Assembly election from Varuna, former Congress chief minister Siddaramaiah’s turf.

According to Vijayendra, the Old Mysuru region is “a tough nut to crack” for the BJP, given that it is a strong JD(S) bastion and with Shivakumar. “We will start mobilising booth-level cadre. Once we start winning local elections, we will be poised to win Assembly elections,” Vijayendra, who is currently involved in the party’s campaign in the Sira bypoll, told DH.

According to political analyst Harish Ramaswamy, the BJP’s ascent in the Old Mysuru region was just a matter of time. The KR Pet victory strategy, he said, involved projecting a parochial connection between BJP and Vokkaligas. “Now, they’re trying to push Hindutva into the sizable population of Vokkaligas.”