JOIN USKarnataka State Congress unit president G Parameshwara has said that the results of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike elections indicate the party is losing even the Ahinda (Kannada acronym for minorities, backward classes and dalits) voters who are considered to be supporters of the Congress.
A day after the results of the Palike were announced, the Congress leader did some plain-speaking. He is in the process of analysing the results and preparing a report to be sent to the party high command though such a report had not been sought. In an interaction with this newspaper, he said it was generally believed that the Ahinda voters were by and large with the Congress.
“In this election, even they have gone against us. This is a major concern,” he said. Asked what might have made them move away from the Congress, on whom the party banked during the last Assembly elections, Parameshwara said he was clueless why the party had lost the traditional votes, too.
“It is said a major portion of the Ahinda votes have not come to us. It is time for us to take corrective measures. The same old stand adopted by the party can’t continue. Besides the votes of dalits, backward classes and minorities, we have to take major communities too into confidence,” he said.
Parameshwara, who is still studying the ward-wise results, said that in many wards, the party had lost the seat with a narrow margin of 500 votes. The party had expected 100 plus seats and it was achievable. Unfortunately, the target was not reached. “When the voter turnout was poor till afternoon on the polling day (August 22), it was said the voters belonging to major communities and the IT crowd had kept off from voting. But at the fag end of the voting hours, the voter turnout swelled. We do not know what happened at the ground level,” he said.
The Congress chief said some leaders in his party were of the view that the people did not accept the stand of the government to trifurcate the Palike. In addition, efforts to postpone the elections also became a setback for the party.
“But we did not go wrong in our campaign strategy. There were only 10 rebels in the fray. We have deputed good officers to the Palike. But there could be many reasons to lose the battle in the capital,” he added. Asked whether the chief minister would be able to take up reshuffle and expansion of the ministry at this juncture, Parameshwara said this was the right time for the exercise which could serve as a corrective measure.