Karnataka LoP post also goes to Yediyurappa camp: R Ashoka is BJP pick after 6-month delay

Ashoka or ‘Samrat’ Ashoka, as the new BJP leader is often referred to by followers and detractors, is seen as belonging to the camp of B S Yediyurappa. This marks the complete return of the Lingayat leader’s reign in the party, after the selection of his son Vijayendra as state chief.

The run-up to the BJP Legislature Party meeting on Friday was also marked by friction, with a protest by veteran leader and former Union minister Basavaraj Patil Yatnal, who was an LoP aspirant too and earlier lost out in the state chief post race to Vijayendra.

“Why is it that nobody from north Karnataka gets to be a leader in the party? Why is it that only leaders from the south are given these responsibilities?” Yatnal, a Lingayat like ex-CM Yediyurappa, said. Ashok, as well as another LoP frontrunner, C N Ashwathnarayan, are both Vokkaligas and hail from Bengaluru in south Karnataka.

In the run-up to the Assembly elections, the central BJP leadership was seen as trying to take the party out of the control of Yediyurappa, to set a new team in place which was allied with the party’s national organisation secretary B L Santhosh. However, the poll debacle and the coming Lok Sabha elections appear to have forced the BJP to do a rethink.

Ashoka has been clear about his loyalties, and in 2021, when the BJP was in the process of forcing Yediyurappa out as CM, in favour of Bommai, had declared: “We are with Yediyurappa, I am with Yediyurappa.”

His choice as LoP will also aid the BJP’s new-found alliance with the JD(S) for the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, as Ashoka is known to have good ties with its first family and the state’s tallest Vokkaliga leaders, the Deve Gowdas.

Ashoka in fact represents the Padmanabhanagar Assembly constituency in south Bengaluru, where former PM H D Deve Gowda resides. The fact that Ashoka has been undefeated for seven Assembly elections is often seen as a factor of his political understanding with the Gowda family.

There was some speculation that the BJP would pick an OBC as LoP to get this community group behind it, after appointing a Lingayat as state chief and after its alliance with the Vokkaliga Deve Gowdas. Ashoka’s seniority appears to have outweighed this, with the veteran’s 35 years of experience in BJP politics expected to get warring party factions and leaders to work together under Yediyurappa’s 47-year-old son.

“We will work together without differences and controversies. We will work with unity like twin bulls to ensure that the party wins all the 28 seats (in Karnataka) in the Lok Sabha elections,” Ashoka said after his appointment.

He added that the BJP’s 66 and the JD(S)’s 19 together make up 85 MLAs in the Assembly, “which is not a small number”. “We will jointly fight for the needs of the people.”

Ahead of the meeting, Ashoka said: “Our only objective is that Narendra Modi becomes Prime Minister once again. So the new leader will be elected without any confusion or hindrance. I spoke to Sunil Kumar, Ashwathnarayan… whoever becomes the leader, there will be no differences. The party is first, Modi as PM once again is our slogan.”

During the Assembly polls, the BJP had picked Ashoka for the prestige fight against state Congress chief and now Deputy CM D K Shivakumar, from Kanakapura in rural Bengaluru, apart from his usual Padmanabhanagar constituency. While he lost to Shivakumar, Ashoka proved his worth to the party.

Ashoka’s drawback remains that even after all these years in politics and senior positions, he has not been able to establish his own standing in the Vokkaliga community. After the Deve Gowdas, the tallest Vokkaliga leader is seen as Shivakumar.

Previously, Ashok ahad been appointed by the BJP to lead the party in the Vokkaliga heartland of Mandya, but had to beat a hasty retreat as the local BJP leadership opposed his “adjustment” brand of politics with the JD(S), in a region where politics is raw and head-on.

On Friday, after Ashoka was named the BJP legislature party leader, Congress spokesperson Ramesh Babu took a swipe at this. Referring to the BJP leader’s ties with the Deve Gowdas, Babu posted: “Congratulations to the leader of adjustment politics on being elected as the leader of the BJP in the state legislature. Let his priority be to take the adjustment politics of the Padmanabhanagar constituency to the whole of the state. The fight of deprived communities continues (in the BJP).”