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For Karnataka loss, BJP pins blame on anti-incumbency, local factors
Karnataka election: BJP’s decision to change the CM stemmed from the hope that it would buck anti-incumbency, like it had done in Gujarat and Uttarakhand. But in Karnataka, the decision evoked resentment among the powerful Lingayat community
New Delhi Neither its promise of development through a “double engine” government nor its strong Hindutva push could help the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) retain power in Karnataka as it managed to win just 64 seats, down from 104 in 2018, despite a high-voltage campaign that included rallies and roadshows by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and several top ministers.
For the party, which was bullish that it would turn a 27-year cycle of anti-incumbency into pro-incumbency, Saturday’s defeat is a blow that could put paid to plans of expanding the party’s footprint in the southern states. Karnataka, after all, is the only state in the region where the BJP has a significant cadre on the ground, and has been in power before.
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Senior party leaders attributed the defeat to multiple factors -- discontent against the state government, changing the chief minister midway through his term, pushing an ideological agenda instead of local issues -- and admitted that a perception of corruption and administrative deficiencies overshadowed the party’s campaign blitz.
The Yeddy factor
A senior state party leader said that one dominant factor in the party’s defeat was its decision to replace as chief minister Lingayat strongman BS Yediyurappa -- who virtually built the state unit from the ground up -- with Basavaraj Bommai two years ahead of the polls.
“The inability of the party paraphernalia to communicate to the people the work that was done and the changes it brought to people’s lives worked against us. Then, of course, was the inability to successfully build ties with other castes, such as the Vokkaligas (11%), the Kurbas (9%), and upsetting the Lingayats by changing the CM,” the leader said, asking not to be named.
Also Read: Three key takeaways from the Karnataka results
The decision to change the CM stemmed from the hope that it would buck anti-incumbency against the BJP, like it had done in Gujarat and Uttarakhand. But in Karnataka, the decision evoked resentment among the powerful Lingayat community that makes up 17% of the vote bank, and has sided with the BJP over the past few election cycles. In 2013, too, the BJP lost after the Lingayats chose to back Yediyurappa when he broke away from the party and floated his own Karnataka Janatha Paksha (KJP).
Although Bommai is a Lingayat too, he does not have the kind of hold that Yediyurappa has over the community. To make things worse, charges of corruption and administrative lapses on Bommai’s watch gave the Congress enough ammunition to train its guns at the BJP.
“Bommai was unable to tackle the corruption allegations. His elevation to the top post, though he himself had a clean record, made matters worse for the party because he paled in comparison to Yediyurappa,” said a second leader on condition of anonymity.
The decision to usher in a generational shift by giving tickets to 72 new faces and dropping senior leaders such as former chief minister Jagadish Shetter and former deputy CM Laxman Savadi, was also not supported by a section of the party cadre. “There was a message that the old guard had been unceremoniously dropped,” the second leader said.
To be sure, Prime Minister Modi and the senior BJP leadership later reinforced that the elections were being fought under the leadership of Yediyurappa, who is now a member of the party’s parliamentary board. The message, however, did not fully translate into votes on the ground, the leaders cited above said.
Social engineering attempt
Given the centrality of caste in the state’s polity, the party’s social engineering strategy of bringing together diverse groups also failed to enthuse voters. The BJP fielded 47 Vokkaligas, 68 Lingayats; 37 Scheduled Caste, and 18 Scheduled Tribe candidates in the elections.
While it somewhat retained the support of the Lingayats, its attempts to woo Vokkaligas, known to sway election outcome in about 40-plus seats of the 224-member assembly, were less successful, leaders aware of the internal dynamics said.
Though the party inducted Vokkaliga faces such as D Sudhakar, who was made health minister, and HT Somashekar and V Gopalaiah, and gave larger roles to leaders such as Lok Sabha MP Shobha Karandlaje, party general secretary CT Ravi, and state minister CN Ashwath Narayan, the community still chose the JD(S) and the Congress over it, these leaders added.
“The BJP was hoping that while it will continue to be the party of choice for the Lingayats, and the rejig in internal reservation will play a key role in drawing support from the SC, ST and OBCs castes that are divided among all three parties,” the first leader quoted above said.
To counter the Congress’s Ahinda coalition of Alpasankhyataru (minorities), Hindulidavaru (backward classes) and Dalitaru (Dalit) communities, the BJP came up with the Libra --Lingayat plus Brahamins — model by rejigging reservation quotas. Though the state government’s decision of scrapping 4% reservation for Muslims and redistributing it among the Vokkaligas and Lingayats, and increasing the percentage of reservation for STs from 3% to 7%; and for SCs from 15% to 17%, dominated the poll narrative, it could not be converted into votes.
Inability to counter charges
The Congress’s catchy “PayCM campaign” to target the government on corruption caught the BJP on the wrong foot, and graft complaints from various sections -- from government contractors to seers -- caught the public’s pulse. The BJP’s attempts to turn the tables on the Congress by alleging that the state will be turned into an ATM for the Gandhi family if it comes to power, could not tilt the scales in its favour.
So, when the opposition cornered the government on rising prices of fuel and essentials, job losses and tanking economy after Covid, the BJP raised the pitch on interfaith marriages, religious conversions, Savarkar yatras, and recasting Tipu Sultan as anti-Hindu.
“In the coastal belt, the sentiments are pro-Hindutva. But the party’s attempts to coalesce the Hindu vote bank to counter the consolidation of Muslims in support of the Congress in other parts of the state was flawed. In the rural areas, particularly, there was very little support for issues such as (ban on) halal and hijab. Only the reference to Bajrang Bali towards the end of the campaign (in response to the Congress hinting at a ban on the Bajrang Dal) drew some support,” said a third leader.
Asked why the party kept pushing hard on issues that polarised voters along religious lines, the leader said the BJP saw a sliver of opportunity that it could convert the anger against the government into a bigger narrative about internal security and appeasement policies of the Congress.
“When the Congress said they will ban Bajrang Dal and equated them with PFI, which has terror links, the party felt it was necessary to send out a message that it will not allow appeasement politics. Whether it was wrong is debatable,” he added.
Experts said it was a case of getting too many things wrong for the BJP, and principal among them was the belief that there is a pan-Karnataka acceptance for the Hindutva agenda and on the party’s reliance on national leaders.
“This is a vote for political stability as after a long time a party has been given a clear mandate. The election also shows that the BJP needs to revisit its over-dependance on PM Modi’s popularity, and on raising national issues instead of local ones,” SY Surendra Kumar, professor of political science at the Bangalore University, said.
