By Fakir Balaji
Bengaluru, Dec 11 (IANS) The resounding victory of the ruling BJP in Karnataka's Assembly by-elections has made Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa remain as its lucky mascot in south India, a party official said on Wednesday.
Despite several factors against him such as he not being among the favourites of the party leadership in Delhi, age-factor and the party's stance on leaders above 75 years of age and the cases he had to face, the victory in the by-elections has asserted his position and given the BJP its only and stable government in the southern India.
"By making the party win 12 of the 15 Assembly seats, including three in Bengaluru and seven in the state's northwest region, Yediyurappa has again demonstrated his leadership and proved to be the strongest Lingayat community leader in the southern state," BJP's state unit spokesman A. Vamanacharya told IANS here.
It's the second time in this year, Yediyurappa led the party to a near sweep after winning 26 of the 28 Lok Sabha seats across the state in the April-May 2019 general elections and reducing the Congress and JD-S to retain only one seat each despite they contesting jointly under a pre-poll alliance and on a seat-sharing basis.
The 76-year-old Yediyurappa became the BJP's first chief minister in May 2008 and the only southern state in which the party came to power for the third time in over a decade.
Leading the party's poll battle, Yeddiyurappa proved his mettle again by achieving majority (117), which eluded him in the May 2018 Assembly elections and forced him to resign on May 19 or three days after he formed the party's government for the second time on May 17, 2018, as he fell 8 seats short of the simple majority, with 113 as the halfway mark in the 225-member House, including one nominated with voting right from the Anglo-Indian community.
Though the BJP won 105 seats in the May 2018 Assembly elections and fell 8 short of the simple majority, the opposition Congress and Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) prevented our party from being in power by entering into an opportunistic post-poll alliance and forming a unstable coalition government on May 23, 2018.
Yediyurappa became chief minister for the third time on July 26 after the 14-month-old fledgling JD-S-Congress government fell following the defeat of the confidence motion its then chief minister H.D. Kumaraswamy moved in the Assembly on July 18 for want of majority, as 14 Congress rebels 3 JD-S rebel legislators resigned and abstained from the House in defiance of their party whip.
"The people reposed faith in Yediyurappa again by voting for the party in the by-elections despite fielding 13 defectors, including 10 from the Congress and 3 from the JD-S, as they wanted a stable government in the state for development under his leadership," asserted Vamanacharya.
Yediyurappa's popularity and sympathy from the people for being denied right to govern by the opposition parties repeatedly made the BJP even wrest the Krishnarajpete Assembly seat from the JD-S in Mandya district, about 160 km from Bengaluru, breaking the stronghold of the regional party (JD-S) in the bastion of the dominant Vokkaliga community, to which its supremo H.D. Deve Gowda and his prodigal son (Kumaraswamy) belong to.
In Bengaluru, the BJP wrested the prestigious K.R. Pura and Yeshvantpur seats from the Congress and the high-profile Mahalakshmi Layout from the JD-S.
Ironically, the Congress returned to power in the 2013 Assembly elections, as Yediyurappa quit the BJP over differences with its then high command and floated a regional party - Karnataka Janata Party (KJP), which not only split the BJP votes, but also reduced its strength in the lower House to a mere 40.
The return of Yeddyurappa to the BJP in late 2013 revived its fortunes as the party won 18 of the 28 Lok Sabha seats from the state in the 2014 general elections under his leadership. He also won from the Shivamogga parliament constituency.
On reprieve from courts in various cases related to freeing of lands from government control (denotification) and his alleged involvement in the iron ore mining scam that rocked the state from 2001-2010, Yeddyurappa was made the party's state unit president and declared him as its chief ministerial face ahead of the May 2918 assembly elections.
The rise of Yeddyurappa to the top executive post for the third time from the ranks of being an ordinary activist in the right-wing Hindu organisation -- Rashtriya Swayam Sevak (RSS) has been anything but smooth, as controversies dogged him throughout his five-decade-old political career.
Born on February 27, 1943 in Mandya district, about 100km from here, Bookanakere Siddalingappa Yediyurappa (BSY) is upbeat on continuing in the office for the remaining three-and-half years of the Assembly term till May 2023.
The veteran politician won for the eighth time from the Shikaripura assembly segment in his home district of Shivamogga in the Malnad region in May 2018 Assembly elections.
Yediyurappa's long-term association with the RSS and Jan Sangh since boyhood instilled a sense of hard work and pride to do social work and entered politics for public service, especially farmers, women and youth.
--IANS
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