Ballari: Janata Dal (S) supremo, H D Deve Gowda is all set to campaign for Mr V S Ugrappa of the Congress, who has been fielded for the Ballari Lok Sabha bypoll on October 29, according to party sources.
Mr Gowda will join senior Congress leader, Mallikarjun Kharge and former Chief Minister, Siddaramaiah to campaign for the Congress MLC, whom he once described as his 'manasa putra, ' but fell out with later.
"Ugrappa, P G R Scindhia, B L Shankar and Y S V Datta were considered Deve Gowda’s four four manasa putras during the heydays of the Janata Parivar. Now only Scindhia and Datta are still with him," notes a senior JD(S) leader.
It was Mr Gowda who gave a ticket to Mr Ugrappa, an advocate at the time, to contest the Lok Sabha poll from Chitradurga way back in 1989 on a Janata Paksha ticket. Later, however, Mr Ugrappa quit the Janata Dal to join the Congress along with Mr Siddaramaiah.
While his father appears to have decided to let bygones be bygones, Chief Minister, H D Kumaraswamy has reportedly decided not to campaign for the November 3 Ballari bypoll. According to sources, he is not keen on campaigning for Mr Ugrappa, who has been highly critical of him in the past.
Mr Kumaraswamy will, however camp in Shivamogga district between October 28 and 31, to campaign for his party’s candidate, Madhu Bangarappa for the Lok Sabha bypoll from the constituency and later hit the trail for JD(S) candidate, L R Shivaramegowda in Mandya for the other Lok Sabha bypoll, according to the itinerary released by his office.
