Karnataka Polls: Kumaraswamy firms up strategy

New Delhi: It finally might have nothing to do with much touted “secularism” as the JD(S) chief ministerial candidate, H.D. Kumaraswamy could tilt towards the party willing to support him to form the government in the event of a hung assembly.

“We are a secular party and will not form an alliance with any other party,” Mr Kumaraswamy’s father, former PM and national president of JD(S), Mr H.D. Gowda claimed when accused of being BJP’s “B-team.”

Sources revealed that in the event of a hung Assembly and if the JD(S) managed “enough seats” the party would be willing to “compromise” if the saffronites agreed to prop up Mr Kumaraswamy as the next Chief Minister. 

Some JD(S) functionaries felt that the party would require to win nearly 40-45 seats out of the 224 to stay in the game and call the shots. 

Incidentally Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s praise of Mr Gowda at a rally in Udupi in Karnataka had given rise speculations that both JD(S) and BJP were “looking at the post-poll scenario”.

While the PM’s praise and Mr Kumaraswamy’s reported meeting with the BJP chief were being viewed as a “possibility of a future nexus” between the two outfits, some indicated that the developments could cost the party the minority votes. Muslims who form nearly 13 per cent of the state’s population is a crucial vote bank for the non-BJP outfits. 

The PM had said, “I hold the door open for Gowda when he visits me, I escort him to the car door when he leaves. That is the respect a former PM deserves, which others do not understand.”

In what was viewed as a damage control exercise, Mr Gowda tried to downplay the PM’s praise.