The chinks in the BJP’s armour have been exposed again with its MLA S.T. Somashekhar indulging in cross-voting in the Rajya Sabha polls and another MLA Shivaram Hebbar abstaining from voting in a battle that had turned risky due to the aggressive approach of fielding an additional candidate from the BJP-JD(S) alliance.
This gains significance just ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, even though the parameters for the general elections are different. It also comes even as the party state unit is trying to strengthen itself after an organisational rejig with the appointment of new State president and a new team of office-bearers.
Second loss
This is the second defeat that the BJP-JD(S) alliance is suffering ever since both the parties formally forged an alliance, the first being the loss in election to the lone seat for Legislative Council.
Some of the BJP insiders feel that the party should have understood the ground realities as well as its limitations and desisted from allowing the JD(S) to field an additional candidate. The party should have taken adequate measures to keep its flock together, let alone wooing votes from rival camp, they maintained.
More than the defeat of the additional candidate, what has caused embarrassment for the BJP is the fact that two of its own MLAs acted against it. The concern among the party is that any legal remedy against such violators of the party whip appears to be bleak.
Lateral entries
As both these MLAs were inducted into the party through operation kamala mode of getting MLAs from the rival camps to quit and contest bypolls on BJP ticket, some of the party leaders also feel that the BJP is paying the price for relying heavily on such “political defectors” to form its government. Also, much to the shock of the party, its former member and mining baron Janardhana Reddy too supported the Congress candidate.
The BJP had faced a similar situation about two decades ago when nearly half a dozen of its MLAs had cross-voted in favour of liquor baron Vijay Mallya in the Rajya Sabha polls during the regime of the then Congress government led by S.M. Krishna.
