Congress leaders in Karnataka expect electoral gains in their state as a ripple effect of party president Rahul Gandhi contesting the Lok Sabha polls from Wayanad just across the border in Kerala.
In particular, they expect positive results in southern Karnataka constituencies, where the BJP has been making inroads over the years.
State Congress vice-president B.L. Shankar said party workers in Karnataka were already charged up.
“This is a historic moment — a third member of the Gandhi family has picked a southern seat,” Shankar told The Telegraph on Wednesday, alluding to Indira Gandhi contesting from Chikmagalur in 1978 and Sonia Gandhi from Bellary in 1999. Both these seats are in Karnataka.
“Of course, our party workers in Karnataka would have been even more enthusiastic if he (Rahul) had chosen to contest from this state. But, then, Wayanad is not too far away for the impact to be felt in several of our constituencies,” Shankar said.
Wayanad is located at the tri-junction of Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu and is 270km from Bangalore.
The Congress believes the Karnataka constituencies most likely to gain from Rahul’s presence in Wayanad are Mysore, Bangalore Central, Bangalore North and Dakshina Kannada — all held by the BJP.
Shankar linked Rahul’s decision to contest from Kerala, and not Karnataka or Tamil Nadu, to the Sangh parivar’s strident agitation over the implementation of the Supreme Court directive to allow women of childbearing age to enter the Sabarimala temple.
“The BJP has been whipping up communal sentiments over the Sabarimala issue in Kerala, where they have never won any Lok Sabha seat,” he said.
“I think his decision was aimed mainly at smothering whatever impact the BJP has created over Sabarimala. With his entry, the entire focus has shifted to him.”
Although Kerala BJP president P.S. Sreedharan Pillai has publicly admitted that the Sabarimala campaign “did not achieve the expected results”, the party has kept the issue alive in the lead-up to the Lok Sabha polls.
Academic and political analyst Harish Ramaswamy, however, questioned Rahul’s decision to contest from a Left-ruled state where the communists are the Congress’s main rivals.
“I don’t understand the logic of Rahul being made to contest from Kerala,” Ramaswamy told this newspaper.
“First, he is taking on the Left (as the BJP is a minor player in Kerala), who are sure to be (post-poll) allies of the mostly left-of-centre Congress. Second, Rahul should be contesting against the BJP to accentuate his party’s anti-BJP stand.”
Ramaswamy added: “Rahul should get the right people to advise him and not land up in the kind of soup he is in now by running (for Parliament) from Wayanad.”
Rahul will be contesting from his pocket borough Amethi in Uttar Pradesh, too, where his main rival will be the BJP candidate.
Karnataka Congress president Dinesh Gundu Rao dismissed all criticism of Rahul’s decision to contest against the Left in Kerala.
“What’s wrong in contesting from Wayanad? Let us not read too much into this,” Rao told party workers in Mangalore on Tuesday.
“Although we would have loved to get him elected from Karnataka, eventually it’s all the same as his entry will do a lot of good for the party in the south.”
