Three actors-turned-politicians from the Kannada film industry, a former Chief Minister's son and a sitting MPs wife have turned the three bypolls to the Karnataka legislative Assembly into a riveting contest.
All three constituencies will see a straight fight between the ruling Congress and the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Janata Dal (Secular-JDS), which will be the first litmus test for all the parties after the Lok Sabha polls and in the background of the various scams levelled against the Siddaramaiah government.
Bypolls to the three constituencies- Channapatna, 60 km from Bengaluru, Sandur in Ballari district and Shiggaon in Haveri district are, in a way, proxy wars being fought between the Congress and NDA leaders representing these assembly segments to establish their supremacy. Among the three, the most watched constituency is Channapatna in Ramanagara district, now renamed as Bengaluru South, where Union Minister HD Kumaraswamy and Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar are locked in a leadership tussle to establish their supremacy in the Vokkaliga community, which both represent.
Channapatna is the home turf of Kumaraswamy, who won from here in the 2023 Assembly polls and vacated after he got elected to the Lok Sabha from Mandya this year. This Vokkaliga-dominated constituency is an Assembly segment of the Bengaluru Rural Lok Sabha constituency, which was represented by Shivakumar's brother, DK Suresh, from 2013 to 2019. He was defeated in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls by Kumaraswamy's brother-in-law, Dr CN Manjunath, a noted cardiologist.
The bypolls were necessitated with Kumaraswamy representing Channapatna getting elected to the Lok Sabha from Mandya, former Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai from Shiggaon winning the Haveri parliamentary seat, and E Tukaram from Sandur bagging the Ballari Lok Sabha seat. The counting of votes for these constituencies will be on November 23.
In Channapatna, it's now or never battle for actor-turned-politician Nikhil Kumaraswamy, son of Kumaraswamy, who is the NDA candidate. He takes on the Congress nominee CP Yogeeshwara, who was in the BJP till October 23. He resigned from his BJP MLC seat last week after the party failed to get him an NDA ticket and joined the Congress, which seemed to be the first round of victory for Shivakumar in his running political feud with Kumaraswamy. The BJP was keen on fielding Yogeeshwara, a party-hopper, who has contested from all parties, including as an Independent, with the exception of the JD(S). Known as a “jumping star” with his sandalwood background, Yogeeshwara admitted that he is a turncoat.
According to JD(S) sources, Kumaraswamy did not want to cede the constituency to Yogeeshwara, who is considered a strongman there, as the former plans to return to state politics in the future, and Channapatna would be the base. Along with Shivakumar, the Union Minister's other political rival in Channapatna is Yogeeshwara, who was defeated by Kumaraswamy in the 2018 and 2023 Assembly polls and 2009 Lok Sabha polls from Bengaluru Rural. In 2013, Yogeeshwara defeated Kumaraswamy's wife, Anitha, from the same constituency.
With the Congress poaching Yogeeshwara, the NDA was left with no choice but to field Nikhil Kumaraswamy, who has had two back to back electoral defeats. A win will position him as the political heir to the Deve Gowda controlled JD(S).
Both the Congress and the NDA are banking on the Vokkaliga votes, highest in Channapatna, which are likely to be split. The decisive votes for the candidate's victory will be the Muslims, Scheduled Castes and the Other Backward Classes, who apart from supporting the Congress have handed victories to Kumaraswamy and Yogeeshwara, irrespective of their party affiliations in the past.
In Shiggaon and Sandur, dynasty politics decided the candidates. Former Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai's son Bharat Bommai is the NDA candidate from Shiggaon and here too stakes for the father are high, if the constituency has to remain with the family in future. The Congress has been traditionally giving the Shiggaon seat to a Muslim, who are in good number after Panchamasali Lingayats (sub-sect of Lingayats) here.
The youth Congress seemed to have been able to convince the party's high command to give the ticket to their nominee Yasir Ahmed Khan Pathan, overlooking Syed Azampeer Khadri, who has been unsuccessfully contesting against Basavaraj Bommai from 2008 to 2023. “Pathan has come from the youth Congress cadre and is a good fighter. We have to groom young leadership,” Congress MLA Rizwan Arshad said. Pathan is a protege of adjoining Hangal party MLA Srinivas Mane, who was former Youth Congress president. An upset Khadri, who had filed his nomination papers as a rebel, was convinced to withdraw by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar after he was assured that he would be given a suitable post in the party.
Sandur, a reserved constituency for the Scheduled Tribes, has been a Congress stronghold since 1989, except for a break in 2004 when it was won by Santosh Lad on a JD(S) ticket. He is now in the Congress and a Minister in the Siddaramaiah government. The constituency was represented by Tukaram since 2008, who vacated it after getting elected from the Ballari Lok Sabha seat. The Congress party has given the ticket to his wife, Annapurna, a political novice, and the NDA candidate is sandalwood actor and businessman Bangaru Hanumanthu.
Ballari, which shot to global fame when Congress leader Sonia Gandhi contested and won the Ballari Lok Sabha seat in 1999 and in late 2000 for its illegal mining activities, is witnessing a high decibel campaign. Two politicians who are out on bail are campaigning for their respective parties. Former minister B Nagendra, arrested and released on bail in the alleged embezzlement of the Karnataka Maharishi Valmiki Scheduled Tribes Development Corporation funds, has been campaigning for Annapurna along with ministers Lad and BZ Zameer Ahmed Khan.
Gangavathi MLA G Janardhan Reddy, who rejoined the BJP in May 2024, will be campaigning in Ballari after 14 years for NDA candidate Hanumanthu. The Supreme court recently lifted a 15 year ban allowing him to enter his home district Ballari. Reddy had been barred from entering Ballari, Anantapur, and Kurnool districts following his arrest by the CBI in September 2011 over allegations of illegal mining. The ban was imposed over fears that he could tamper with evidence if in Ballari.
According to sources in the Congress and NDA, while it's a battle royale in Channapatna, the two other constituencies' verdict would depend on whether things have changed there since May 2023.
