Hubballi battle turns into BJP-RSS vs Shettar

Karnataka Assembly Election

From donning the crisply starched and ironed white-and-khaki uniform of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) to sporting a traditional Muslim cap, Jagadish Shivappa Shettar has come a long way.

And, even before he completes familiarizing himself with his new party, the Congress, after spending a lifetime with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP, his political future will be locked in the electronic voting machines in Hubballi on May 10.

The former Karnataka chief minister, who left the BJP last month and moved to the Congress, won the Hubbali Central constituency six times as a BJP candidate. He is up against the BJP’s Mahesh Tenginkai, and also has to contend with federal Home Minister Amit Shah, BJP President Jayaprakash Nadda and senior leader BL Santhosh, who are all heavily invested in Tenginkai’s campaign.

BJP journey 

Not too long ago, the relationship between Shettar and Tenginkai was described as one between Guru and Shishya before the two found themselves on the opposite sides of the political.

Shettar’s father was a member of the erstwhile Jana Sangh, f Forerunner to the BJP,  for decades. Shettar quit the legal profession in the 1980s and gravitated towards the BJP, with which he stayed until April 17, 2023, the day he joined the Congress.

The BJP had fulfilled all the wishes of the senior Lingayat leader in the past two decades. But his one demand went unheard by the top brass – renomination for the upcoming Assembly polls, leading to his decision to quit.

Shettar was a member of the teams led by BS Yediyurappa, HN Ananth Kumar and Pralhad Joshi in broad-basing the BJP in North Karnataka. By default, he became the chief minister after Lingayat strongman Yediyurappa had to quit the post in July 2012.

Yediyurappa first appointed DV Sadananda Gowda as his successor. Later, he ousted Gowda and brought in Shettar.

Shettar’s duration as chief minister was short as the State went to the polls in April 2013. He could not restore the party back to power in 2013.

He also served as the industries minister, rural development minister and revenue minister of Karnataka. Much against his wishes, Yediyurappa made him Speaker of the Legislative Assembly in 2008. He was also leader of the Opposition for nearly four years and state party president.

The party has not come out with any convincing reply as to why Shettar was not renominated to contest the upcoming elections.

Shettar has likely received more mileage than any other politician during the current Karnataka election cycle. The central authorities of the BJP may not have anticipated that Shettar would revolt, resign, and challenge the party as a candidate of the Congress.

After all, Shettar, who has an image as a gentleman politician and was never heard speaking harshly to anyone, stuck to his guns only twice in the past: when he refused to continue as Speaker and when he refused to join the Basavaraj Bommai cabinet.

Keeping his distance 

Shettar’s reasoning was that after serving as chief minister, it would not be right for him to serve as a minister in the cabinet of a man junior to him in politics. The fact remains that Shettar defeated Bommai in the 1994 assembly elections when Bommai was a Janata Dal nominee. He preferred being a minister rather than speaker.

Since Bommai became the chief minister in 2021, Shettar was not seen very active in party programmes, although he had never expressed his intention of quitting the BJP. After relinquishing the BJP’s membership, Shettar is not badmouthing Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Amit Shah, or Yediyurappa. He is fuming only against BL Santhosh, the BJP National General Secretary (Organisation).

BJP-RSS epicentre  

Hubballi is the epicenter of BJP and RSS activities in North Karnataka. Prime Minister Modi always gets a rousing welcome there from the locals. Shah has predicted that Shettar would lose the poll battle as Hubballi has always voted for the BJP. He has given a clarion call to the people to defeat Shettar at least by a margin of 25,000 votes.

Lingayat strongman and former chief minister Yediyurappa has announced that the party will work hard to ensure Shettar does not win. These developments show that the BJP is perturbed by Shettar’s departure.

Union Minister Prahlad Joshi, a native of Hubballi and MP from Dharwad, has been insisting that Modi and Shah decided to field a younger leader in place of Shettar.

But Shettar is trying to put up a brave front by aggressively attacking the BJP while crisscrossing the constituency. For the record, the constituency has about 245,000 votes. Of these, Lingayats constitute about 71,000, Muslims 43,500, scheduled castes and tribes 32,000, and the rest are distributed among other communities.

Shettar is now banking heavily on the Congress’ traditional vote bank alongside the support of his Lingayat community.