It is not just a conflict between old politicians and young, impatient ones. It’s also one between the old economy and the new. Captain Gopinath, the founder of Air Deccan, has joined the fray with support from leading lights of Bangalore’s IT and biotechnology industries. More significantly, it is also a conflict between the state’s old style of politics and the one introduced by B.S. Yediyurappa’s BJP.
The BJP’s rise to power in the state has been closely linked to the political emergence of the mining barons of Bellary. As these gentlemen switched from bicycles to helicopters, they introduced a relatively new dimension of private patronage in politics. The Yediyurappa government took this process to another level by offering ministries to opposition legislators who would resign their seats and switch parties. While campaigning for re-election, they left little room for doubt that they expected themselves and their constituencies to benefit financially from this switch.
Spurred by the success of this strategy in gaining the BJP a majority in the assembly, Yediyurappa has extended it to the parliamentary elections. He has identified families in each constituency who apparently have the financial muscle to carry out private patronage, irrespective of the party they belong to. They have been offered BJP tickets. In one case, a Congress MLA has been given the parliamentary ticket and his son the ticket for the assembly seat he resigned. The assumption clearly is that this election is being fought entirely on constituency-specific issues—and may the strongest family win. But in offering an open house to politicians of all hues, the BJP has made the supporters of Hindutva restive. They have responded by attacking women and churches, alienating sections of Christians and youth who had supported the BJP recently. And in rural areas too, offering a single family the right to rule a district may not go unchallenged. Other families could cobble together rival alliances. Yediyurappa may also find that state patronage can become a double-edged weapon. The BJP government has offered significant financial support to religious maths. But this has caused dissent among maths which believe they deserve a larger share. It has also brought the government into the vortex of math politics. As a result, a swamiji of some importance is now standing on a Samajwadi Party ticket in Tumkur, where the BJP has had considerable success earlier. Yediyurappa may have lowered his defences, but it doesn’t mean the others will be able to land more than the odd blow. H.D. Deve Gowda had to get rid of so many leaders to ensure his son’s rule was not challenged that his influence has been considerably reduced.
The Congress, on the other hand, has absorbed so many leaders that they are all quite capable of pulling each other down. The party has tried to minimise this risk by giving most of its senior leaders a ticket, in the hope that they will be too busy to be meddlesome. But these senior leaders will have to convince the aspiring Congressmen in their constituencies that they will make room for them in the not-too-distant future. And where newcomers have got the ticket, there’s the problem of taking the seniors along.
By the time Krishna Byre Gowda’s procession reaches the Muslim-dominated Tilak Nagar, the crowd of leaders on his vehicle has thinned out. He switches from Kannada to Hindi to reach out to the Urdu-speaking women peeking out of their windows. He even manages to finally convince the local MLA to move to the front of the vehicle and say a few words. But he must know that no matter what the opportunities the BJP may have provided him, he and the Congress are some way from the unity needed to tap them.
