Siddaramaiah, former Chief Minister, held another round of meeting with leaders from Varuna Assembly constituency in Mysuru on Wednesday.
Mr. Siddaramaiah had held a meeting last month to ascertain the causes for the decline in the Congress’ lead over BJP in the recently-held Lok Sabha elections in Varuna Assembly segment.
Varuna Assembly segment, now represented by Mr. Siddaramaiah’s son, was earlier represented by the former CM himself.
On Wednesday, Mr. Siddaramaiah met booth committee members from Thandavapura Zilla Panchyat constituency in a closed-door meeting. Each booth committee has 13 members including the president. Mr. Siddaramaiah took stock of the voting pattern in each booth.
On Thursday, he has invited members of the booth committee from Hadinaru Zilla Panchayat constituency for a meeting.
Areas covered
“So far, such meetings had covered Gargeshwari, Tagadur and Kavalande, besides part of the T. Narsipura Town Municipality. On Wednesday and Thursday, Thandavapura and Hadinaru will be completed. During the next visit, a similar booth-level meeting pertaining to Mellalli and Varuna Zilla Panchayat segments will be held,” a source in the Congress said.
Though Congress candidate R. Dhruvanarayan had polled 79,404 votes in Varuna Assembly segment, Mr. Siddaramaiah’s critic and BJP candidate V. Srinivas Prasad secured as many 70,402 votes here, bringing down the Congress’ lead from more than 58,000 votes in the 2018 Assembly polls and 33,000 votes in the 2014 Lok Sabha polls to just 9,002 in the recent Lok Sabha elections.
The meeting with booth-level workers of Varuna last month had sparked off speculation in sections of the media that Mr. Siddaramaiah could be preparing for mid-term polls. The former CM took to Twitter to clarify that similar exercises would be held across the State to strengthen the party in the wake of the reverses in the recent Lok Sabha polls.
