NEW DELHI: No matter who forms govt, the
Karnataka assembly election verdict has thrown up some clear winners and losers and some winners who may turn losers.
Here is a list of winner, losers and some winners who may end up as losers:
Yet again proves mettle as champion campaigner. BJP’s numbers will help validate the Modi model since a key part of the PM’s campaign was to pitch his government’s ability to deliver on big schemes within deadlines, such as electrification of villages. The PM remains popular, drawing large crowds, and charges of sectarianism and intolerance do not seem to have dimmed the sheen in his fourth year in office and, crucially, less than a year ahead of the next Lok Sabha polls.
Karnataka polls: Data hub
The
BJP chief complements Modi as a risk-taker and adds the skills of a micro manager of elections. The decision to settle the leadership argument in favour of B S Yeddyurappa, and seeing to it that all factions fell in line, was implemented ruthlessly. Called on influential Lingayat mutts to ensure most stayed neutral on Congress’s move to declare the community a religious minority. Held roadshows and met small caste leaders to counter Congress’s AHINDA (minority-OBC-Dalit) plank. Now has the task of trying to get hold of 6 to 7 MLAs to tie up the trust vote for BJP — a job that will test his ‘post-poll’ management.
BS Yeddyurappa
The Lingayat strongman delivered the vote in his areas of strength, living up to his billing as a neta with a pan-Karnataka grassroots appeal. It is a remarkable comeback for the leader who was isolated in BJP and walked out to form his own party in November 2012. He returned to BJP in January 2014 and launched a state-wide yatra to mobilise the BJP base ahead of the polls. A taciturn man, he does not much believe in accommodating rivals, but has fought off graft charges to re-emerge as the party’s top neta in Karnataka, tantalisingly close to the big prize.
Read also: Who should get first call to form govt? Jury's out
The Gowdas
HD Deve Gowda achieved a prime goal in the polls: To stop Siddaramaiah becoming CM again. Having stalled the man he considers a traitor, he then showed not the slightest hesitation in considering an offer from Congress for JD(S) to lead the government. The move indicates that Gowda and son
Kumaraswamy can never be written off. They have ridden on a high consolidation of Vokkaliga votes and also of other groups at the cost of Congress. Kumaraswamy, who has been CM once with BJP support, has ended up listening to his father despite alleged differences.
Rahul Gandhi
Despite Congress’s moves to strike a deal with JD(S) and snatch an unlikely victory, Rahul Gandhi's leadership of an opposition alliance will remain under challenge from the likes of Mamata Banerjee and Telangana’s K Chandrashekar Rao, who have proposed a federal front. His attacks on PM Modi and BJP for being anti-Dalit and anti-minority and for planting RSS appointees in key positions along with the decision to seek impeachment of the chief justice of India do not seem to have got much traction. He may have to go beyond a negative campaign to emerge as a serious contender in 2019.
Siddaramaiah
Congress had banked heavily on the CM, who looked to forge an AHINDA coalition of minorities, backward classes and Dalits and relied on his many welfare schemes. But parts of the coalition failed in areas dominated by BJP and Deve Gowda’s JD(S). Though Congress’s vote share was larger, BJP won with a higher strike rate. Siddaramaiah’s policies, while populist, were also perceived to be selective and his wooing of Muslim voters seems to have created a backlash that fed BJP’s Hindutva appeal.
