Commenting for the first time on why Tejaswini Ananth Kumar, the late Union Minister Ananth Kumar’s wife, was not given party ticket to contest from Bengaluru South, BJP national joint secretary B.L. Santosh said, at a meeting of the party’s ideologues and workers in Chamarajanagar on Wednesday evening, that the party cannot allot ticket to candidates on the basis of their genes and DNA.

He went on to say that the party does not buy the argument that giving ticket to Ms. Tejaswini would amount to respecting the late leader. “The contributions made by Ananth Kumar for growth and development of the BJP has been documented and the respect due to him will be there even 50 years from today. But one cannot transfer the credit for it to his wife or anyone else,” said Mr. Santosh. He pointed out that Tejaswini has been made the party vice-president and has been given an opportunity to prove herself and grow, which nobody could question or prevent.

Incidentally, his remarks have not gone down well with a section of the party functionaries. This assumes significance as Ms. Tejaswini was favoured to be fielded from Bengaluru South whereas the party brought in BJP Yuva Morcha leader Tejasvi Surya instead, which shocked the party’s rank and file.