The result of the byelection to K.R. Pet Assembly constituency on Monday has rendered a major blow to the Janata Dal (S), which has still not recovered from the shock of party’s debacle in the general elections to Mandya Lok Sabha constituency earlier this year.
The party had fielded advocate B.L. Devaraj in the byelection and was expecting a comfortable victory. It had campaigned hard against K.C. Narayana Gowda of the BJP, who on Monday ended up winning with 66,094 votes. Mr. Devaraj managed to get 56,363 votes while former MLA K.B. Chandrashekar of the Congress was relegated to third place with 41,665 votes.
Many senior JD(S) leaders in the district say the “differences” that surfaced between former Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy and some senior leaders, including MLAs and MLCs, resulted in Mr. Devaraj’s defeat. Ever since the party fielded Nikhil K., Mr. Kumaraswamy’s son, in the Lok Sabha polls in 2019 and faced defeat against Sumalatha, who contested as an Independent, the differences have been growing. A senior party leader said the rift would only deepen now. The party had won all seven Assembly constituencies in the district in 2018, the Lok Sabha byelection in 2018, and over 60% of the seats in urban local bodies and panchayat raj institutions in the last two years. Moreover, two representatives in the Legislative Council from the district — N. Appaji Gowda, MLC from Mandya local authority constituency, and K.T. Srikante Gowda, MLC from South Graduates’ constituency — are also from the JD(S).
Speaking to The Hindu here on Monday evening, the party leader said that in spite of having a good contingent of elected representatives from gram panchayats to the Legislative Assembly in the district, the party had failed to retain the K.R. Pet Assembly seat.
Some of the party MLCs had openly expressed their displeasure with Mr. Kumaraswamy recently. Secret meetings were also held against him. In spite of all this, he did not change his ways, the leader said. According to him, unnecessary importance was given to former Minister C.S. Puttaraju, MLA for Melkote, and many others were ignored. Such issues prompted Mr. Gowda to join the BJP.
The JD(S) will convene a reconciliation meeting to discuss the bypoll outcome and its impact on the party in Mandya. The party is expected to change some of the main leaders in the district and in the K.R. Pet taluk unit at the meeting, another leader said.
Start of downfall?
The bypoll result is being termed the start of the party’s downfall in the district. K.R. Pet Assembly constituency had witnessed 16 elections, including bypolls, since 1952 previously. Of the 16, the Congress won seven time, Independents and JD(S) represented the constituency three times each, and Janata Dal leaders won twice. The Janata Parivar represented it once.
Mr. Kumaraswamy had staked his reputation on the constituency this time.
