Bengaluru, 5 June

BJP continued its winning spree by bagging the maximum number,19 out of the total 28 seats, along with electoral ally JD(S) in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. The ruling Congress won the remaining 9 seats.

The results tally of 17:9:2— BJP: Congress: JD(S)—is a repeat performance of the 2014 Lok Sabha polls. The single-digit tally for the Congress is a major setback as the party was aiming to win between 15 and 20 seats.

Banking on the five welfare guarantees, of which three are women-centric, the Congress had hoped to break the stranglehold of the BJP in Karnataka. The nine seats won by the Congress are: Kalaburagi contested by AICC President Mallikarjun M Kharge’s son-in-law Radhakrishna Doddamani; Chikkodi (Priyanka Jarkiholi, daughter of minister Satish L Jarkiholi); Chamarajanagar (Sunil Bose, son of Minister HC Mahadevappa), Raichur (G Kumar Naik, retired bureaucrat), Koppal (K Rajashekar Basavaraj Hitnal), Bidar (Sagar Khandre, son of minister Eshwar Khandre) and Ballari (E Tukaram, sitting MLA).

In the seats Congress lost, its biggest upset was from Bengaluru Rural represented by Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar’s brother DK Suresh, who had won in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Congress lost the seat this time to noted cardiologist Dr CN Manjunath, son-in-law of former prime minister HD Deve Gowda. Manjunath made his debut into electoral politics on a BJP ticket and became a giant killer as both Shivakumar and Suresh— known as the ‘DK brothers’ had made Bengaluru Rural an impregnable fort.

Former prime minister HD Deve Gowda also faced a setback as the much-awaited result of Hassan Lok Sabha seat contested by now suspended JD(S) MP and grandson Prajwal Revanna was wrested by Congress’ Shreyas Patel Gowda. Prajwal is behind bars as he was accused of sexually abusing women and video graphing the act on his phone.

Gowda had bequeathed the Hassan seat to Prajwal, whom he was looking for as his political heir.

Bengaluru seats’ performance: All four seats— Bengaluru North, Bengaluru South and Bengaluru Central were retained by BJP candidates, with the latter opening its account in Bengaluru Rural.

During the counting of votes, there was hope for the Congress in Bengaluru Central contested by AICC Secretary in-charge of Telangana Mansoor Ali Khan. He maintained an impressive lead of over 70,000 votes against sitting BJP incumbent PC Mohan. However, Mohan overtook him when the counting was taken up for Mahadevapura and Rajajinagar represented by BJP MLAs, and he retained the seat with a margin of 32,707 votes. —Salar News

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) which repeated its 2017 performance by winning 17 Lok Sabha seats this year depended on the Modi factor to consolidate its vote share. Both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah held several road shows and rallies in the State which seemed to have worked in favour of the BJP candidates.

The Congress was also hoping that the dissent in the BJP and the anti-incumbency factor would help in breaking the BJP stranglehold on the State, especially as the saffron party had changed candidates in 15 constituencies. Another political strategy of the Congress was giving 13 tickets to the kin of party leaders including the children of nine ministers. Of these, only three sailed to victory.

The three coastal seats---Uttara Kannada, Dakshina Kannada and Udupi- Chikmagaluru went along the expected lines of the BJP retaining it. The Congress performance was good in Kalyan Karnataka, while it faltered in Kittur Karnataka.

Speaking to the media after the results, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah admitted that the Congress in Karnataka could not meet its estimation of winning 15 to 20 seats. But the Congress had improved its vote share from 31.88% in 2019 to 45.34% this time as against the BJP’s which had dropped from 51.38 per cent to 46.04 per cent now. He attributed the overall low polling as one of the reasons for the Congress’ failure to get the adequate numbers. Defeated Congress MP Suresh said: “I have worked for the people of my constituency. The people have given the opportunity to a new person, wishing that he does good work for the constituency, state and the country. I am an ordinary worker of the party. I grew up among the people of the constituency, I will continue to be with you. Victory and loss are part of democracy and we have to accept it. I was very hopeful of winning given the work done for the constituency. I will continue to work as a party worker.’’

Asked if the BJP-JDS alliance worked, he said, “Both strategy and conspiracies work in politics, We will continue to fight for the people. Politics is not a necessity for me, I am in politics for the people.”

Reacting to the poll results, former Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy, who won from Mandya with a huge margin of 2.84 lakh said: “The BJP-JD(S) alliance could have won 20 to 22 seats, but for the over-confidence in some leaders.’’

What does this Congress loss mean to Siddaramaiah & DKS?

The single-digit seats are certainly going to have some political repercussions. According to Congress sources, DK Shivakumar who was eyeing the Chief Minister’s seat after the Lok Sabha elections is likely to lose his bargaining power. It is also being said that there could be a change of guard at the state unit with Shivakumar who has been at the helm since 2020 being replaced Also, the defeat of the Congress candidate in the Mysuru-Kodagu Lok Sabha seat is an embarrassment to Siddaramaiah as it is his home turf. —Salar News