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For both the Congress and BJP, a lot is at stake in Karnataka, where results will be declared Saturday. The state remains one of the only remaining bastions of the Congress. A win here would be a huge boost for it – Himachal Pradesh is the only state it has won since the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. The BJP, on the other hand, would want to hold on to the only southern state it currently enjoys power in.
These are the five key contests on which all eyes will be trained Saturday:
Varuna (Mysuru district): Siddaramaiah vs V Somanna
Leader of Opposition Siddaramaiah and Housing Minister V Somanna are pitted against each other in Mysuru district’s Varuna constituency. This is one of the two constituencies where the BJP has fielded top ministers against Congress heavyweights. The other is Kanakapura, where Revenue Minister R Ashoka is up against state Congress president D K Shivakumar.
Somanna is a popular leader from the Lingayat community, the BJP’s traditional support base. The BJP is hoping to get most of the 50,000 Lingayat votes in the constituency — of the 2.23 lakh voters — to pull off an upset.
Siddaramaiah hails from the Kuruba community, categorised as an Other Backward Class (OBC), which together makes up around 40,000 votes. Given that Lingayats are traditional BJP voters, the outcome may hinge on which way the SC vote swings.
The fortunes of both the leaders are tied to the seat. Siddaramaiah needs the win to boost his chances of becoming Chief Minister for the second time, while Somanna will want to take down a heavyweight such as Siddaramaiah to boost his credentials as a top Lingayat leader in the state. Somanna is also in the fray from Chamarajanagar.
Initially, Siddaramaiah had expressed reservations about contesting from his old turf, which he has represented twice since it was formed in 2008, and given up last time for his son. He had instead pushed the party leadership to field him from Kolar. He was said to have been open to contesting from both seats. However, the party did not take a chance and fielded him from a safe seat.
In 2018, Siddarmaiah had contested from Chamundeshwari in Mysuru district and Badami in Bagalkot district, and ended up losing from Chamundeshwari.
Siddaramaiah’s younger son and incumbent Varuna MLA Yathindra led the campaign for his father in the seat, while BJP leaders actively campaigned for Ashoka.
Shiggaon (Haveri district): Basavaraj Bommai vs Yasir Khan Pathan
Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai is seeking re-election from this seat for the fourth straight term. He was initially expected to secure an easy win, but the BJP now seems to be having a slight challenge on its hands.
Bommai is up against Shashidhar Yaligar of the JD(S) and Yasir Khan Pathan of the Congress. By fielding Yaligar, the JD(S) has tried to reach out to the Panchamasali sub-sect of Lingayats — a majority among the 70,000 Lingayat voters in the segment. Estimates put the total voters in the area at 2 lakh. Bommai is also a Lingayat, but is from the numerically smaller Sadar subsect.
Muslims constitute the second largest community at Shiggaon, and are followed by Kurubas. The Congress is banking on the minority and Kuruba votes for a win. The party was, however, caught on the wrong foot at the time of candidate selection. It first fielded Yusuf Savanur, who hails from Huballi, but named Pathan a day later.
Though the JD(S) and Congress have put up a strong show, it is expected to be challenging for the parties to dent Siddaramaiah’s popularity.
Channapatna (Ramanagara): H D Kumaraswamy vs C P Yogeshwar
Former Chief Minister and JD(S) heavyweight H D Kumaraswamy is contesting from the seat. He has been a six-time MLA and has won four Lok Sabha elections – 1996, ‘98, ‘99 and 2009 – from constituencies within the Ramanagar district.
The seat is a Vokkaliga stronghold, with almost 50% of the 2.3 lakh voters here from the community. The Vokkaligas are a key base of the JD(S).
Kumaraswamy will face off against BJP MLC C P Yogeshwar, also a Vokkaliga. The BJP candidate, a former actor, won from the constituency as an Independent in 1999 and retained the seat again in 2004, 2008, 2011, and 2013 on a Congress, BJP and Samajwadi Party ticket respectively. He had defeated Anita Kumaraswamy, the wife of Kumaraswamy, in 2013.
The following election, he stood second, securing around 66,000 votes against Kumaraswamy’s 87,000 votes. That year, Kumaraswamy also contested from Channapatna. When he subsequently became the CM, he retained Channapatna and resigned from Ramanagara. Anita was elected to the seat later in a bypoll.
SCs form the second-largest group here, followed by Muslims.
Hubli-Dharwad Central (Dharwad district): Jagadish Shettar vs Mahesh Tenginayaki
As a BJP bastion, the seat is turning out to be a prestige battle for the party. The constituency was formed after the delimitation exercise in 2008 and the BJP has been winning this seat ever since. This is also the seat of former CM Jagadish Shettar, a tall Lingayat leader and six-time MLA, who rebelled and joined the Congress last month after being denied a ticket from here.
Despite Shettar’s absence, the BJP is relying on its strong cadre in the segment and has fielded its Karnataka general secretary Mahesh Tenginakayi. The choice of the BJP candidate here was subject to much debate, with Shettar blaming BJP general secretary (organisation) BL Santhosh of favouring his loyalists during ticket distribution.
The importance of the seat can also be gauged from the fact that several top national leaders, including Union Minister Amit Shah and Congress leader Sonia Gandhi, campaigned here. The contest is expected to be a photo-finish.
Athani: Laxman Savadi vs Mahesh Kumathalli
The Congress campaign in Athani and the larger Kittur Karnataka or Bombay Karnataka region was centered around the alleged “insult” meted out to Lingayat leaders within the BJP. It was only bolstered by resignations of Lingayat leaders such as Shettar and former Deputy CM Laxman Savadi from the BJP.
Savadi, a three-time MLA from Athani, was a popular leader within the BJP ranks and was made the Deputy CM in 2018 even as he lost the polls.
But the situation changed after the 2019 defections. Mahesh Kumathalli, the MLA who had won from Athani in 2018, was among the 17 Congress and JD(S) legislators who moved to the BJP.
Savadi lobbied for ticket during the 2019 bypolls, but Kumathalli was fielded. He also ended up winning the seat again. Savadi continued to remain hopeful, but the BJP high command decided to retain Kumathalli for this time’s elections.
