Karnataka poll also to decide fate of nascent federal front, NDA allies

Vibha Sharma
Tribune News Service
New Delhi, May 11

Voters in Karnataka on Saturday will decide the future of not only the state and its three lead players (the BJP, Congress and JD(S)) but also of the nascent federal front and NDA allies.

After a month of highly acrimonious election campaign, Karnataka will vote on May 12 to pick from among the ruling Congress and the two aspirants hoping to replace it—the BJP and JD(S). The choice they make will also set in motion the 2019 Lok Sabha plans of all lead players--both national and regional satraps.

Observers predict a close call and perhaps a hung Assembly.

May 15 will decide whether PM Narendra Modi again managed to save the day for the party and will throw up interesting political possibilities across the country.

Let there be no doubt that Karnataka was a personality combat between Modi and Congress president Rahul Gandhi.

The BJP, which is struggling with perceptions about an urban-rural divide and unrest in key vote bank--Dalits and farmers-- can heave a sigh of relief if it makes it to the centre stage.

The saffron win will reconfirm the PM’s invincibility and also silence voices in allies about the BJP’s individual standing and ability to win. Apparently, some NDA allies are keeping a close watch and may jump the ship in case there is any turbulence in Karnataka. Even if they don’t, they can certainly make life difficult for BJP chief Amit Shah when they sit on the negotiating table for the 2019 polls.

What happens if the Congress manages to retain Karnataka? It would come as a shot in the arm for the party gasping for breath in the wake of the Modi tsunami since 2014. It would confirm incumbent Siddharamaiah’s supremacy as a regional strongman and boost Rahul’s national credentials, which so far have not been much to write home about.

The most interesting would be the case if former PM HD Deve Gowda-led JD(S) manages to pull it off. Both the BJP and JD(S) have denied the possibility of their coming together after the poll but politics is an art of possibilities and is known to make strange bedfellows.

This apart, the JD(S) doing well in Karnataka will boost the hopes of those trying to put together an anti-BJP, anti-Congress front before 2019. Deve Gowda has been a PM before and who knows what the Karnataka results would throw up to push him into the national limelight.

In any case, a regional party doing well will re-confirm the hopes of other regional players--the Trinamool Congress, Samajwadi Party, BSP and BJD.

But for the BJP, it then would become twice as hard to pull off the next three big ones--Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan.

Though party leaders claim the BJP is winning all the three states it holds, the fact is the Congress’s impressive performance in the Lok Sabha and Assembly bypolls and civic body elections is a cause of concern.

Assembly polls in the three states are due at the year-end. Despite their “popularity” Shivraj Singh Chouhan (MP) and Raman Singh (Chhattisgarh) face 15 years of anti-incumbency. They are also said to be facing discontent from some sitting MLAs, including senior ministers.

Chouhan has an added problem in the form of the simmering anger in the farming community. Many of his popular schemes are not having the desired effect on the ground, sources claim. For the BJP winning MP is important given that it is the bastion of its ideological fountainhead--the RSS.