Editorial: BJP-mukt Dakshin Bharat

A significant trend emerging from the latest Assembly polls is that Karnataka is moving towards a bipolar polity

Hyderabad: The Karnataka mandate is a clear public repudiation of the politics of hatred pursued by the BJP. The saffron party had deliberately kept the communal pot boiling in the run-up to the elections, focusing on polarising issues like hijab, halal and jihad in the face of mounting anti-incumbency and public anger against an effective and corrupt government. The resounding victory for the Congress comes as a big boost for the grand old party ahead of the next year’s general elections. A significant trend emerging from the latest Assembly polls is that the southern State is moving towards a bipolar polity with the Janata Dal (Secular) getting marginalised in its hitherto stronghold of old Mysuru region. With a clear majority in the 224-member Assembly, the Congress, having bagged 136 seats, is set to form the government on its own without any need for support from regional parties. In the past, a friction-ridden coalition arrangement with the JD (S) was the reason for political instability and the eventual collapse of its government. Though the BJP has retained its vote share of 36%, it ended up losing more than 40% of its existing 116 seats in the Assembly. The fact that its tally stood at 65 seats now— compared to 104 seats it won in 2018 with the same voting percentage — shows that the high vote share has come from only two specific regions of the state — Old Mysuru and Bengaluru — unlike the previous elections when the vote share was from across the State.

“BJP-Mukt Dakshin Bharat” is the catchword doing the rounds in the political circles, following the Karnataka verdict, as a counter to the saffron party’s battle cry “Congress-mukt Bharat’. This is the first major State victory for Congress after its leader Rahul Gandhi’s ‘Bharat Jodo’ Yatra and is likely to warm the hearts of the non-BJP players and shape the campaign narrative for the next round of Assembly elections in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Telangana. It is also expected to boost the opposition efforts to build an anti-BJP coalition at national level. For the octogenarian Karnataka leader Mallikarjuna Kharge, the first Congress president outside the Gandhi family in over two decades, the victory on the home turf will cement his position as an assertive decision-maker who has started the process to reverse the course of the party’s declining fortunes. The challenge before the party is to put its divided house in order in poll-bound States like Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. For the BJP in Karnataka, the writing on the wall was clear much before the election fever began. Poor governance, corruption, and divisive politics had strengthened the anti-incumbency sentiments. With party’s tallest leader BS Yediyurappa being out of contention, the numerically strong and influential Lingayat community, the backbone of the BJP’s support base, has clearly moved towards the Congress.

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