A month ago, the Bharatiya Janata Party chose Bhagwant Khuba, a new entrant to electoral politics, over Lingayat patriarch Gurupadappa Nagamarapalli’s son, Suryakanth, as its nominee from the Bidar Lok Sabha seat. The upset supporters of the Nagamarapalli camp accused the BJP leadership of handing over the seat on a platter to Congress nominee N. Dharam Singh.
However, with a few days left for polling, it does not look like Mr. Singh will get a walkover.
The reasons are many: the anti-incumbency factor against Mr. Singh being the first. In most towns of the constituency, voters, especially the younger lot, talk about his age and related weakness, rather than his achievements. This trend is not as evident, however, in villages.
BJP’s prime ministerial nominee Narendra Modi’s arrival in Bidar seemed as if to ratify the party’s decision. The police say around 60,000 attended his rally. BJP leaders claim Baba Ramdev’s ‘Yoga Diksha Sabhe’ invited a similar attendance.
Mr. Khuba is a confident man. “If you add the votes of the BJP and the Karnataka Janata Paksha candidates in the Assembly polls, our tally is one lakh more than the total votes the Congress got,” he said. “The Congress will be destroyed. The Janata Dal (Secular) will have to struggle to get the third slot,” he predicted.
Bandeppa Kashempur, former Agriculture Minister and a confidant of JD(S) leader H.D Kumaraswamy, is challenging Mr. Singh and Mr. Khuba. The leader from the Kuruba community has been a legislator from Bidar City and Bidar South in the past. He says his party nominees had got a total of 2 lakh votes in all the eight Assembly seats last year. “I have been facing elections for over a decade. But, I have never received such positive response from voters,” he said.
Abdul Hameed Faraan of the Welfare Party of India (WPI) and Shankar Bhayya from the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) are the other significant candidates.
Bidar is the only place where the WPI is fighting the polls. Party office-bearers and cadre are camping in the district. They might succeed in consolidating at least a fraction of the Muslim vote. The BSP has a proven record of uniting the Dalit and Muslim voters in Bidar. Syed Zulfikar Hashmi rode the blue elephant to the Assembly in 1994. BSP nominees have upset the cart for other candidates in previous elections. In 2009, the party candidate got 23,000 votes.
Chandrakant Kulkarni, a professor of mechanical engineering, is the face of the Aam Aadmi Party here. He lost his job after filing nominations against his college committee’s advice. Unlike other candidates, he is candid about his chances. “I was feeling desperate about governance and wanted to fight it. This election is a test to see how many people feel the same way. I know nice guys finish last, especially in Indian elections. But for how long can we keep complaining from a distance?” he asked.
At 24, Bidar has the highest number of candidates in the State. Half of them are Independents. These candidates, apart from the major six, are expected to walk away with at least one lakh votes.
Mr. Singh, however, does not look like he is worried. “I have done many things for Bidar decades before I thought of contesting here. As Public Works Minister, I approved the Bidar-Srirangapatana highway. As Chief Minister, I established the veterinary university and the government medical college. Now, we got the Union government to set up the National Investment and Manufacturing Zone, a satellite centre of the Moulana Azad National Urdu University, and a common facilitation centre for Auto Nagar. Bidar has also got additional funds through schemes such as the multi-sector development programme and the backward region grant fund. Importantly, young people are already getting benefits of regional reservation under Article 371(J). All this will help me,” he said.
