Bengaluru: The question whether former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda will contest the upcoming Lok Sabha elections remains a mystery with the JD(S) supremo said to be unable to make up his mind.
His son and Karnataka chief minister HD Kumaraswamy described it as a “dilemma.” He said on Thursday that Gowda has given away his constituency Hassan to grandson Prajwal Revanna, but both HD Revanna and Prajwal are now asking him to contest from Hassan.
“If he decides to contest, he will file his nomination from either Bengaluru North or from Tumkur constituency,” Kumaraswamy said.
The statement has led to speculation that it was yet a bid by the JD(S) supremo to contest from his present constituency Hassan as it is considered a safer bet when compared to the other two.
A senior Congress leader, on the condition of anonymity, said that if Gowda contests from Bengaluru North, he will have to rely on his political student and former chief minister Siddaramaiah’s help because the party has five out of eight MLAs in the Bengaluru North parliamentary constituency.
“All five Congress lawmakers are close to Siddaramaiah and if he decides to topple Deve Gowda, it is possible. Just because of coalition government is in state, Siddaramaiah is pretending to be all okay with Gowda’s family, but it’s not the truth,” said the leader.
Bengaluru North is presently held by BJP’s Sadananda Gowda, who was the former chief minister of the state. The constituency is also a Vokkaliga stronghold, which is why Deve Gowda had decided to claim the constituency during seat sharing with Congress. But sources in JD(S) say, a victory for him here won’t come easy.
Meanwhile, Deputy CM and Congress leader G Parameshwara is not happy as the party gave Tumkur constituency to JD(S). The Congress’s state unit has said that JD(S) should return the seat if Deve Gowda does not contest from it.
Congress' Mudda Hanumegowda is the current MP from Tumkur and known to be a close associate of Parameshwara. According to sources, he is considering joining the BJP to contest the elections from the seat if he can’t get the Congress ticket. So contesting from Tumkur, too, won’t be a cakewalk.
According to the grapevine, this may be the reason why he may have changed his mind about ceding the seat to Prajwal.
However, taking the seat back won’t be straight forward as the JD(S) has given a ticket to Kumaraswamy’s son Nikhil from Mandya, and can’t say no to Revanna’s son Prajwal. Additionally, Kumaraswamy’s son was not into active politics while Prajwal was always said to be eager for his debut.
The JD(S) has decided to file the nominations of all candidates on March 25. Gowda’s dilemma will have to be solved by then.
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