BJP's 'gateway to the South?' Hardly

By Ramakrishna Upadhya
In Tamil Nadu and Kerala, with strong regional and Communist parties, the door is tightly shut, while in Andhra Pradesh, the Congress and the TDP will not let BJP in at least for some time...
Now that the people of Karnataka have given an "historic opportunity" for the BJP to prove its worth and deliver on its promises, it's time to analyse the verdict 2008 and deconstruct some of the myths that accompanied these results.Does BJP's victory in Karnataka mean that it has opened the "gateway to the south" as some people believe?

The Karnataka BJP has been growing steadily since 1994, increasing its vote share from 16.99 per cent to 33.9 per cent now and clearly has emerged an alternative to the Congress. The Janata Dal and its various avatars performed that role since breaching the Congress fortress in 1983 and with their splintering, the BJP has occupied that slot. But, in the rest of the South it is still a marginal player and has a long way to go. In Tamil Nadu and Kerala, with strong regional and Communist parties, the door is tightly shut, while in Andhra Pradesh, the Congress and the TDP will not let BJP in at least for some time.

With power in the hands of BJP, how safe are the minorities and will Karnataka go the Gujarat way?Though the minorities will have some valid apprehensions and the state BJP has not been averse to raise contentious issues like the Bababudangiri hills, the Hindutwa ideology has few takers in Karnataka. The Karnataka BJP functions more or less like a regional party and more importantly, the BJP fought the elections on development issues, completely sidelining its Hindutwa plank. In fact, when the BJP was in power along with the JD(S), it was less aggressive about Bababudangiri than during the Congress rule.

In a peace-loving Karnataka, the BJP's stock will go down the moment it adopts divisive politics.How did an urban-based, "north Indian" party like BJP make inroads in the nook and corner of Karnataka?The BJP has taken nearly two decades to gain acceptability among the people and B S Yeddyurappa had an important role to play. Besides being an acceptable face of the dominant Lingayat community (16 per cent of the state's population), he has been a true mannina maga fighting for farmers' rights, championing the state's causes on Cauvery and Krishna disputes, etc.

More importantly, except the minorities, the BJP has become much more of an inclusive party, explaining why it won 28 out of 51 reserved seats.How much credit does BJP's so-called "wizkid" Arun Jaitley deserve for the party's victory in Karnataka?Very little. He managed to keep the dissenting voices down and make the state leaders work together, but the central leaders had little role to play in the success. In fact, some of them were privately sceptical of BJP overtaking the Congress, but the people in their collective wisdom decided to give it a chance.

How and where did the Congress lose the plot in this election?It did not cash in on Siddaramaiah' s entry. It appeared scared of the election and banked on postponement after delimitation. The party knew that Mallikarjun Kharge did not inspire as a leader, but dithered on replacing him as KPCC chief. It brought back S M Krishna for a role in state politics, but left him hanging, sending confusing signals to the voters. In the selection of candidates, it pandered to the wishes of factional leaders who had individual agendas, rather than going by the "winnability" in every constituency.

The party failed to mount an united campaign and it had no face to project as chief ministerial candidate.After a worse-than-expected showing, will the JD(S) survive as a party?The JD(S) is back to being a party of the Vokkaliga heartland, but it is not an unfamiliar a situation for it. H D Kumaraswamy has the ability to give it a wider base if he works with patience and perseverance, but his immediate task will be to keep his flock together.What does BSP's unimpressive performance mean to UP chief minister Mayawati?

She was hoping to find a foothold in Karnataka in the run up to the coming Lok Sabha elections and addressed many public rallies, but the final outcome is a set back to her ambitions down South. In fact, so focused was the electorate this time, that they have rejected all smaller parties and elected the smallest number of independents ever to the state Assembly.Will the Karnataka result have an impact on the upcoming Assembly and Lok Sabha elections?The morale in the Congress is right now down, but Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh will be entirely a different ball game. The BJP may take some positives to the Lok Sabha elections, especially from Karnataka, but it again depends on how well the Yeddyurappa government functions in the next six months to a year