Politics | Karnataka bypolls a test for defection politics

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Kamlendra Kanwar

The Karnataka theatrics on government formation which resulted in the Congress and the Janata Dal (Secular) coming together to form a government in May 2018 leaving the single-largest party the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) high and dry, and the subsequent toppling of the HD Kumaraswamy government with BS Yediyurappa assuming power has made a mockery of governance.

The electors are mere spectators as unscrupulous parties ride roughshod over propriety. When time comes for the ballot box they manifest their deep sense of frustration at the betrayal of the mandate and things just drift along.

The acrimonious relationship between the Congress and JD(S) that led to defections from the ruling camp has now led Kumaraswamy to reveal that he is contemplating supporting the BJP-led government to keep the Congress out if the Yediyurappa government loses its majority.

It’s all a rigmarole with power being the lone guiding light for all the three parties, as divorced from propriety. Evidently, relations between the erstwhile allies, the Congress and the JD(S), have reached a dead end and the numerically weakest of the three — the JD(S) — is now on to settling terms with the numerically strongest, the BJP.

In the meantime, the inadequacies of the anti-defection law of 1985 have come to the fore with the Assembly Speaker’s ruling that the 17 disqualified legislators who had defied the whip of their parties to abstain from voting against the BJP would remain disqualified until the term of the current assembly ends. This was recently over-ruled by the Supreme Court to say that the period of disqualification cannot be determined by the Speaker. The apex court consequently allowed them to contest the December 5 by-elections to the Assembly.

Evidently, the anti-defection law deserves a second, hard look, though, admittedly, it has brought some sanity into the ‘Aaya Ram Gaya Ram’ politics of the 1960s and 1970s during which there was no deterrent against defections and consequently such politics was the order of the day.

Politically, it is not inconceivable that the ongoing events in Maharashtra will have a bearing on the outcome of the Karnataka battle. However, unlike Maharashtra where there are a few heavyweight political leaders, in Karnataka there is a crisis of leadership with Chief Minister Yediyurappa being no exception.

It was the bitterness in the relationship between Congress’ former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and Kumaraswamy that bared from day one that the coalition would be a non-starter. As time progressed, the bitterness grew and the central leadership of the Congress with Rahul Gandhi at the helm then only made matters worse. The government, indeed, was a bundle of confusion.

Kumaraswamy’s role has been no better. As Chief Minister in alliance with the Congress he broke into tears on a couple of occasions pleading his helplessness in a government in which the shots were called by the Congress. He showed no perceptible dynamism and seemed obsessed with preserving his chair which ultimately went out of his grasp.

The Congress bigwigs made it a point to rub it in that their party was the senior partner and he would do well to act as a pawn rather than asserting himself. That angered him no end.

Now, with the alliance with the Congress having come under strain, Kumaraswamy, always hungry to be in power, thought it expedient to start building bridges with the BJP with whom he had had a relationship when he was chief minister in an earlier term. He reckoned that with some luck he could find a new deal.

How things would pan out in the by-elections is now a crucial point. If the electorate chooses to punish the defector-MLAs who would now be contesting on BJP tickets, the government would still survive if JD(S) lends the BJP a hand.

Of the 15 seats for which by-elections would be held on December 5, the BJP would need to win six seats excluding the prop from JD(S). The dice is indeed loaded in favour of the BJP retaining power in the assembly, also given the desire of legislators not to precipitate mid-term polls in the state. But the Yediyurappa government would just about totter along.

Good governance indeed seems a far cry for the people of Karnataka which is why Bengaluru, once an enviable city, is today in such a pathetic state with collapsing infrastructure. The Bengaluru example of poor governance is replicated elsewhere in the state too.

Kamlendra Kanwar is a senior journalist. Views expressed are personal.