BJP Karnataka chief Nalin Kateel love jihad remarks not helping party cause, feel state leaders

“It betrays desperation. When the state president asks party workers to focus on an issue like love jihad, which is limited to some pockets in the state, it could be seen as the BJP not having a good report card to present to the people,” a senior party leader from the state said. Elections are due in Karnataka by May.

Addressing party workers in Mangaluru, as part of the Booth Vijaya Abhiyana campaign, Kateel, a Lok Sabha MP from Dakshina Kannada, said: “I am telling you that issues like road and sewage are not the real issues, they are minor ones. There are larger issues… If you are worried about your children’s future and if you want to stop love jihad, we need the BJP for that. To get rid of love jihad, we need the BJP.”

Interestingly, a few months back, when Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai visited the national capital, the message stressed upon him by the party leadership was to focus on developmental issues to return to power. Sources said that he was told that while controversies such as directives on hijab in class room and halal meat might get the BJP some hardcore Hindu votes in a few pockets, to win Karnataka, the party needed to draw a larger support base.

You don’t ask about roads, drainage and other silly issues. It is the question of your children’s life. Love Jihad can be stopped only by BJP. Anti-conversion & Cow slaughter act brought by Bommai government. We will bring act against Love Jihad: Karnataka BJP MP Nalin Kateel pic.twitter.com/UTJmFN720F

— ANI (@ANI) January 3, 2023

In 2018, the BJP had failed to win a simple majority, and seized power after toppling the post-poll Congress-JD(S) coalition government.

According to one leader from Karnataka, Kateel, who faces constant challenge to the BJP state presidency from many quarters, only wanted to convey to the party that emotive issues were important to sway voters. “But the way he framed the sentence, it was wrong,” the leader said.

With Kateel considered close to the BJP’s powerful national general secretary (organisation) B L Santhosh, many detractors see in the controversy an opportunity to steal a march over both. “ Kateel’s remarks show he has not been able to become a pan-Karnataka leader and remains just an MP from coastal Karnataka (which saw the bulk of the pro-hijab protests),” a BJP MP said, adding that Kateel had gone against Modi’s own “development focus”.

The disquiet in the BJP ranks also reflects a larger division within the state unit over the focus to be put on issues such as alleged love jihad or hijab, with many leaders who do not belong to coastal Karnataka opposed to this. It betrays a nervousness too as the Congress mounts an effective challenge on the back of a strong leadership and the success of the Bharat Jodo Yatra in the state, while on the BJP front, Bommai fails to inspire confidence under the large shadow cast by B S Yediyurappa.

While a Karnataka leader accused the party itself of not lending Bommai “the required support”, on the ground it means BJP workers are not looking at the CM for direction.

The BJP national leadership has tried to take matters into its own hands, and sources claimed it had made some success on that front. With Shah ruling out alliance with anyone in the Assembly election, the party is on focusing on its vulnerable areas such as old Mysore and the Vokkaliga-dominated areas.

The BJP is also taking heart from its victory in the recent urban local body elections in Vijayapura in the north and Kollegal in the south. In the coming days, both PM Modi (January 12) and BJP national president J P Nadda (Thursday, Friday) will address meetings in the state, in a bid to boost workers’ morale, sources said.