BJP strives to get all equations right before 2023 Karnataka poll battle

BENGALURU : With less than a year for the next Assembly elections in Karnataka, the BJP is likely to give prominence to regional representation and social engineering in both the government and organisational set up besides giving adequate representation to the two major communities--- Vokkaligas and the Lingayats.  

As Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai hails from the Lingayat community, the BJP is likely to make a Vokkaliga leader from South Karnataka as state party president to strike a balance. The move is also to counter the JDS and state Congress chief DK Shivakumar—also a Vokkaliga— in the Old Mysuru region.
Now, in order to win more seats, the BJP leadership is said to be mulling making Union Minister of State for Agriculture Shobha Karandlaje as the party state president.

The term of the current state BJP chief Nalin Kumar Kateel ends in August. The names of Higher Education Minister Dr CN Ashwath Narayan and BJP national general secretary CT Ravi  are also making the rounds.

With former chief minister and Lingayat strongman B S Yediyurappa still showing enthusiasm, he may be appealed to spearhead the party’s 2023 campaign. If his son BY Vijayendra is not made a minister, he may also stand a chance to become the campaign committee head to counter KPCC campaign committee chairman MB Patil who has been campaigning for separate religious minority status for  the Lingayats, sources said.

The party high command has also planned to make use of the experience of ministers Kota Srinivasa Pujary and Sunil kumar and former RDPR minister K S Eshwarappa. “The party will not let Eshwarappa down and hence instructed him not to vacate the government quarters as he may get a clean chit in the contractor Santhosh Patil’s suicide case”, a BJP leader told TNIE.