BSY toes party line, Gowda plays truant

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The ruling BJP’s attempts to keep two former chief ministers in good stead and ensure a semblance of unity in the party, seems to be getting nowhere. While the party has won a victory by managing to persuade former CM and Lingayat strongman B.S. Yeddyurappa to undertake his state-wide tour under the party banner, it has not been able to win over another former CM, D.V. Sadananda Gowda, who is sulking on the sidelines after being ousted from the CM’s post by the BSY camp.

Though the party wanted Mr Gowda to tour Old-Mysore—a Vokkaliga dominated region where the BJP is weak— and send the right signals across to the community, Mr Gowda is said to have declined the offer. The BJP had even assured him the support of all district units as well as district in-charge ministers for the purpose but Mr Gowda remained unmoved, sources said.

Sources said that Mr Gowda and his camp are upset over the manner in which the party is bending backward to appease Mr Yeddyurappa. On Saturday, party president K.S. Eshwarappa and organizing secretary Mr Santhosh had a meeting with Mr Yeddyurappa to finalise his tour plans. They succeeded in persuading Mr Yeddyurappa, to take out his state-wide tour in north Karnataka districts under the party banner. “This decision to organize BSY’s tour was supposed to be taken at the BJP core committee. Mr Eshwarappa spoke to Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar at the meeting but reportedly kept others in the dark,’’ sources pointed out.

After Mr Yeddyurappa announced his tour plan, Mr Eshwarappa called Mr Gowda and asked him to take up a tour in the Old Mysore region including Chikballapur and Kolar. However, he gently declined the offer. Mr Gowda raised two points with Mr Eshwarappa. The government has a chief minister and two deputy chief ministers. It would not be difficult for the three of them to take charge of 10 districts each in the state, he contended. He felt that when the government was taking care of drought relief measures, two former chief ministers touring drought affected areas would send wrong signals to people. This would also mean the government was inefficient and the district in-charge ministers were not functioning properly, he said, adding that if he toured the old Mysore region, it would give enough ammunition to the media and the public to highlight the differences between him and Mr Yeddyurappa.

Party bosses felt Mr Gowda’s tour of the region would convince the Vokkaligas and other backward community people that they were not being sidelined in the BJP. However, Mr Gowda refused to bite the bait, the sources added.