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Journalism of Courage
The eagerness of Bhavani Revanna — the wife of MLA H D Revanna and daughter-in-law of JD(S) supremo H D Deve Gowda — to contest from Hassan Assembly constituency, appears to have stirred a dispute within the JD(S) ranks and the Deve Gowda family.
A day after Bhavani said that a decision had been taken to make her the candidate from the constituency, JD(S) leader and her brother-in-law H D Kumaraswamy disputed her claim, saying it was not “inevitable” for her to contest from the constituency.
“If her candidature was inevitable, I would have asked her to contest. But it is not necessary, as there is a capable candidate in the constituency,” he said. Hassan is currently represented by Preetham Gowda of the BJP, who defeated H S Prakash by 13,000 votes in 2018. Prakash, who passed away in 2018, was a four-time MLA from the constituency. His son H P Swaroop is vying for the JD(S) ticket from the constituency.
Kumaraswamy later clarified that his reservations on Bhavani’s candidature had not caused any dispute within the family. “We will take a decision without any room for conflict,” he said, while defending the decision to field his wife Anitha Kumaraswamy for Assembly polls in previous elections. Anitha represented Madhugiri constituency from 2008 to 2013 and is currently the MLA from Ramanagar.
Bhavani’s announcement has created confusion among JD(S) workers in the constituency, said Swaroop. Confident of wresting the seat from the BJP in the forthcoming polls, he said he has campaigned in the constituency for the last two months.
The Gowda family has a long list of elected representatives, starting from H D Deve Gowda, a Rajya Sabha MP, his sons Kumaraswamy and H D Revanna (both MLAs), daughter-in-law Anitha, grandson Prajwal Revanna, who represents Hassan Lok Sabha segment and another grandson Suraj Revanna, who is an MLC. Prajwal and Suraj are the children of Revanna.
Kumaraswamy’s son Nikhil Kumaraswamy has also tested the waters of electoral politics and lost to Sumalatha Ambareesh in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
Bhavani, who aspires to contest from Hassan, is not a greenhorn in politics. She has successfully contested zilla panchayat polls and was a favourite as Hassan Zilla Panchayat president in 2016. She is known to have harboured political ambitions since Anitha became MLA. This had led to a bitter feud between the two, which according to reports, forced Deve Gowda to step in to broker peace. However, the party leadership had not conceded to Bhavani’s demand for an MLA ticket, primarily to prevent attacks by other parties such as the BJP and Congress of JD(S) being a ‘family party’.
Bhavani’s “unilateral” announcement as the party candidate comes at a time when the JD(S) leadership is yet to announce a candidate for Hassan. The party had announced candidates for 93 constituencies in December, leaving out Hassan as there were a number of aspirants for the seat.
Over the past year, Bhavani has also had a bitter public spat with Hassan MLA Preetham Gowda. During the feud, Prajwal had stepped in for his mother’s defence, saying his family had helped Preetham’s father, who was a government employee.
