Man who sowed lotus seed in Karnataka

Bengaluru: The master strategist in former Union minister Arun Jaitley was evident when the BJP emerged as the single largest party in Assembly polls held in 2004 winning 79 seats, and in the formation of the first government south of the Vindhyas with Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa at the helm in 2008.  

In 2004, then state unit president, the late Mr H N Ananth Kumar, and senior leader Mr Yediyurappa were at loggerheads at a time when the BJP was gearing up for Assembly elections against Congress government headed by Chief Minister S.M. Krishna. In fact, Mr. Krishna was in a comfortable position, and aiming for a second term as Chief Minister. At this juncture, the party leadership appointed Mr. Arun Jaitley as the leader in-charge of Karnataka as he had successfully evolved strategies for the party's victory in Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh.

Mr Jaitley and his team arrived at a make-shift election office 'Panchavati' on Platform Road, Bengaluru, and commenced back-to-back meetings with state unit leaders, potential candidates for Assembly polls, and some senior leaders in an effort to galvanize all of them to wrest power from the Congress.  

In an almost continuous interaction with leaders, he motivated everyone in the state unit, which saw Mr Krishna growing more tense as he repeatedly remarked "Jaitley magic will not work in Karnataka."  

Mr. Jaitley had the foresight to recognise Mr Yediyurappa's ability to reach out to the masses, in particular, voters belonging to the numerically significant Lingayat/ Veerashaiva community in north Karnataka.

The late leader got inputs from every Assembly constituency about caste calculus, abilities of local leaders and how they should project follies of Mr Krishna's government.

Besides, he also deployed his IT team to reach out to tech-savvy voters through emails and SMS.

The upshot: The Bharatiya Janata Party won 79 seats in the 224 member House, ahead of Congress  (65 seats) and Janata Dal (Secular) (58 seats).

Leaders of the Congress and Janata Dal (Secular), however, struck a post-poll alliance to form the first coalition government headed by late Chief Minister N Dharam Singh.  

The Congress-JD (S) coalition, however, fell apart in 2006. This is when Mr Jaitley returned to the state to knit together a new combination of JD (S)-BJP with the two parties originally agreeing to head the government for 20 months each.  

A year later, Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy reneged on his promise to hand over power to the BJP. The state witnessed Assembly polls in 2008 after a brief spell of President's rule. Mr Yediyurappa, who considered Mr Jaitley, the party's lucky mascot, appealed to central leaders to appoint the latter as in-charge of elections.

On his part, Mr Jaitley prevailed upon top leaders of the party to project Mr Yediyurappa as Chief Ministerial candidate and thus stymie chances of Mr Ananth Kumar to stake claim for the top post.    

In the run-up Assembly polls in 2008, Mr Jaitley advised Mr Yediyurappa to campaign extensively in north Karnataka and to focus on "betrayal" by JD (S) leaders and how they thwarted his chances of occupying the Chief Minister's gaddi. This strategy worked favourably with the BJP winning 110 seats, three short of the magic number required to form the government.

The party formed it's first government in south India with the help of five independents.