Bengaluru: Former chief minister and Karnataka Janata Paksha chief B.S. Yeddyurappa, after a dismal six seats in hand on his maiden outing in the assembly polls should be a dejected man. Instead, despite his party’s abysmal performance in the just-concluded Assembly elections, his phone has been ringing off the hook, with sources close to the former CM saying that top guns in the BJP have begun wooing the man who got them unprecedented success, albeit briefly, including BJP prime ministerial hopeful and Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi.
This has led to BSY seriously examining the options before him over reaching an arrangement with his former party. However BSY has aired his reservations over breaking bread with critics like Ananth Kumar, Sadananda Gowda and former party chief K.S. Eshwarappa. With lack of organizational strength stopping KJP from contesting all 28 parliamentary constituencies, the party is examining whether it should enter a pre-poll alliance with like-minded parties.
Since the Congress has a strong presence in all Parliamentary constituencies, winning at least two or three Assembly seats in each parliamentary constituency, an alliance with the KJP is unlikely, sources said. Instead, he should go for an alliance with regional parties sources said, adding that the two more realistic choices could be B. Sreeramalu’s BSR Congress party and even former arch-rival JD(S).
Why an alliance with JD(S) in LS elections
Loyalists have suggested to former Chief Minister that combining the powerful Lingayat and Vokkaliga communities as BSY and H D Kumaraswamy did before will work to the KJP’s benefit.
“BSY loyalists believe that post the assembly poll there has been a caste polarization where backward class and Dalits votes have come together in favor of the Congress. So it is required for the two dominant communities (Vokkaliga and Lingayat) to come together to defeat the Congress”, said a diehard loyalist of former Chief Minister B.S.Yeddyurappa.
