Parties wooing voters through caste conventions

With Lok Sabha polls round the corner, community conventions to consolidate votebanks seem to be the order of the day with major political parties.

While the Congress kickstarted the convention spree by organising the one for Nayaka community last week in Chitradurga, the JD(S) is following suit hosting a convention for Other Backward Classes (OBC) in Hiriyur. The convention is scheduled for February 2. This apart, JD(S) is hosting Uppara community convention on February 8 in Chitradurga.

Not to be left behind, BJP has planned a massive OBC rally in Chitradurga on February 23. The party is planning to invite its prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi for the event.

With sizeable votebank of backward classes, Chitradurga has become the political ground zero for the parties.

Likewise, JD(S) has scheduled a women’s convention in Tumkur on January 22 and another in Bangalore, for youths in the second week of February. A Third Front convention has also been scheduled in the third week of February in Bangalore.

The Congress, meanwhile, is holding conventions in the next two months targeting voters in Gulbarga, Belgaum, Mysore and Bangalore.

The party, it is understood, is trying to cash in on 371-J special status granted to six districts of Hyderabad-Karnataka region in 2013, by the Congress-led UPA in the Centre, and the Siddaramaiah regime in the State.