Poll-bound Karnataka has only caste leaders, no mass leaders

Can Santhosh make or mar the political careers of super seniors such as former chief minister Jagadish Shettar? If the chief ministerial face of the Congress, Siddaramaiah, who is also perceived as a mass leader, has to rope in his family members, including a minor, to campaign for him in Varuna, how influential is Siddaramaiah?

Also, why did Siddaramaiah wanted to contest from two seats? If JD(S) supremo HD Deve Gowda and his son HD Kumaraswamy could not, for weeks, douse a rebellion at home over party tickets, can they influence the decisions of voters in the state?

What were the major parties doing?

All these developments raise the question: do the three major political parties that have ruled the state have mass leaders in Karnataka?

The paucity of leadership is behind the anarchy in all parties. In the present situation, there is not even a single leader in Karnataka who can influence voters from Bidar to Bengaluru. Some leaders are only claiming so.

The state is seeing only prominent caste leaders who have some sway over their community. In the case of Siddaramaiah, he can't just be branded as a Kuruba leader. He is also the face of Other Backward Classes (OBCs).

Yediyurappa draws strength from his powerful Lingayat community. He wields influence over parts of the Malnad and North Karnataka regions, where there is a sizable Lingayat population.

But the three coastal districts, which have a strong cadre base, and Bengaluru city, as well as urban and rural districts, are not on his radar while campaigning.

JD (S) state president Kumaraswamy has made a vain bid to reach out to voters beyond the Vokkaliga belt. JD (S) supremo HD Deve Gowda, despite becoming the prime minister of the country once, has not made any concerted effort to broaden the party base.

Unexplored regions

In April 2017, Kumaraswamy decided to expand the party's wings to North Karnataka. He rented a sprawling bungalow between Hubballi and Dharwad. Occasionally, he stayed there but never galvanized the party, camping there. Another chief ministerial candidate of the Congress, DK Shivakumar, in his capacity as a minister in 2018, tried to get a foothold in the Lingayat belt via the Belagavi district.

He was seen trying to help out his party's MLA, Laxmi Hebbalkar, in a local bank election. The Jarakiholi brothers, who control politics in many taluks of Belagavi, openly asked the then chief minister Siddaramaiah to make Shivakumar stay out of Belagavi politics. And he did it.

The BJP tried to project R Ashoka, a minister, as the Vokkaliga face of the party. He was put in charge of Mandya district, a Vokkaliga belt, in an effort to oversee the party’s fortunes in the election year.

He was a replacement for Minister K Gopalaiah, also a Vokkaliga. In January 2023, the local party workers ran a ‘Go back Ashoka’ campaign as they didn’t appreciate the replacement. Finally, Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai cancelled the appointment.

Why has Karnataka, for many years, lacked a mass leader, in letter and spirit? Congress leader and former minister PGR Sindhia, who was long associated with the Janata Parivar, says the main leaders of today did not develop any influence over various regions in the state.

"Karnataka had seen two leaders with mass appeal—late chief ministers D Devaraj Urs and Veerendra Patil. In the 1980s, voters used to look up to Ramakrishna Hegde as their leader. The strength of his community —Brahmin—was within 4 percent. Still, he had a good sway over the voting population. His team included me, MP Prakas, Ramesh Jigajinagi, RV Deshpande, Jivaraj Alva, and B Somashekar, all representing various regions. He believed in teamwork. But now, each is a leader, but they are confined to their community or certain districts. There are no leaders to groom the juniors now. Still, to a certain extent, Siddaramaiah and HD Deve Gowda went beyond their castes to influence voters. At least in 7 or 8 districts, they can make an impact on voters," he says.

Shettar, while quitting, had declared that the BJP would lose 20–25 seats because of his exit. Is he such an influential leader? Sindhia rubbishes it, saying, "He can damage the BJP's prospects in some constituencies. However, the question is how many seats can he win in Congress?"

State vice president of the Congress, VS Ugrappa, says in each party, there are a couple of leaders who have been projected as mass leaders. They are leaders because of the positions they hold or for launching government welfare schemes.

‘No statesmen in Karnataka’

"But there is no statesman in Karnataka. Urs, Nijalingappa, and Hegde were leaders in a real sense. Do we have statesmen like Nehru, Vajpayee, or Narasimha Rao now? The present-day battle is for a position. A party has to survive and grow, based on its ideologies and principles,” he says.

Retired IAS officer SM Jamdar, who hails from North Karnataka, had worked with many ministers. In his view, there are no mass leaders with a broad vision. "I have seen tall leaders, such as Nijalingappa, Kengal Hanumanthaiah, Urs, Hegde, and Veerendra Patil. To some extent, Yediyurappa and Siddaramaiah can be called mass leaders. S Bangarappa’s influence was limited to certain districts where his community, the Idigas, was concentrated. Deve Gowda and his son have not been able to penetrate the North Karnataka region. The Congress, under the leadership of Veerendra Patil, could fetch 178 seats out of the 224 assembly seats. None of the present leaders have that sort of charisma. Yediyurappa, under his party banner, KJP, could win only six assembly seats in 2013. The BJP, under the leadership of Shettar, faced the 2013 elections. And it won as few as 40 seats. Lingayats are spread across the state, and their loyalty is not confined to the BJP."

The Congress, since the time of the sacking of Veerendra Patil three decades ago, could not win back the confidence of the Lingayats. But now, it is jubilant as it has turncoat-Lingaytas, Shettar and Savadi, on its side.

The Congress is backing the argument of Shettar that he would have got the BJP ticket but for Santhosh. Both the Congress and the JD(S) are trying to give a spin to the developments by saying the BJP is no longer a pro-Lingayat party because ‘mighty’ Santhosh is keen to appoint a Brahmin CM.

Finally, what is Santhosh’s background?

Santhosh cannot air his views in the media as per RSS norms. There is both appreciation and disapproval for his style of functioning. Senior BJP leader KS Eshwarappa says Santhosh had no role in finalising the tickets. "Santhosh, 56, is an engineering graduate. He hails from Udupi and is unmarried. I had worked with him when he was a full-time Pracharak in Shivamogga. It is a fact that he is a Brahmin (Shivalli). In 2013, when the party won just 40 seats, Santhosh strived hard to hold back the cadre in Karnataka. It was the personal decision of Shettar and Savadi to quit because they did not accept the election committee's decisions. Of course, Santhosh is also on the panel."

For the record, Santhosh hails from a lower-middle-class family. He studied engineering in Davangere. He has been an RSS pracharak for the last three decades. He is fluent in six Indian languages. In 2019, he was accorded the 16th rank in the Indian Express ranking of influential political leaders in India.

The opposition parties and many leaders in the BJP are also apprehensive about Santhosh becoming chief minister. The BJP argues that he is an RSS man and has no desire to be politically active. However, so was

Narendra Modi. He was also a pracharak. So, if Modi could become a chief minister and prime minister, what stops Santhosh from sitting in the chief minister’s gaddi? The possibilities, though, look dim for now.