Published Sep 25, 2022 | 8:00 AM ⚊ Updated Sep 26, 2022 | 11:27 PM
Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai. File photo.
The consistent campaign by the Congress over allegations of corruption against the Karnataka government has left Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai annoyed and frazzled.
Whether it is the “PayCM” poster campaign this week or the “40% commission government” campaign launched in August, the Congress’ attacks are getting on Basavaraj Bommai’s nerves, especially with the BJP unable to effectively counter the narrative.
The impact of these campaigns has polled over to other states.
On 17 September, Basavaraj Bommai was expected to join Union Home Minister Amit Shah in Hyderabad for an event.
Shah’s visit was a showdown of sorts between the BJP and the TRS over the day marking Hyderabad’s integration into the Union of India.
Posters purportedly taunting Karnataka CM Basavaraj Bommai in Hyderabad on 17 September. (Supplied)
The saffron party insisted on it being called “Hyderabad Liberation Day”, while the TRS deemed it “Integration Day”.
In the early hours of 17 September, posters with the words “welcome to 40% CM” were seen at the location where BJP leaders were expected to address a gathering.
While Bommai did not visit Hyderabad that day, he deemed the posters a conspiracy and warned that such acts would adversely impact bilateral relationships between states.
The Congress’ campaigns were first ignored, but then came the defence.
In the case of the “PayCM” posters, cases were filed, even as Congress workers and labourers who put up the posters were arrested.
In retaliation, leaders of the Congress took it upon themselves to put up the “PayCM” QR Code posters, throwing an open challenge to the Bommai government.
KPCC President DK Shivakumar along with LoP Siddaramaiah pasting ‘PayCM’ posters in Bengaluru on Friday. (Supplied)
Under attack continuously, Bommai seemed to have finally arrived at a counter: making his community his shield. To take on the allegations of corruption, Bommai’s aides have turned to his caste identity.
“He (Bommai) is giving good governance, and the Congress is not able to digest it. The Congress did this even to Veerendra Patil. It smears any chief minister who gives a good administration, especially those from the prominent Lingayat community. Bommai is being targeted because he is from the Lingayat community,” Karnataka’s Minister for Health and Medical Education K Sudhakar told reporters on Saturday while defending Bommai.
Sudhakar has been seen as the closest aide of Bommai in the current cabinet that is otherwise a divided house.
Sudhakar’s statements came on the day Bommai himself deemed the Congress’ campaign “dirty politics”.
“If they (the Congress) have any issue, let them come and talk directly, produce documents and then demand an inquiry. What they are doing is nothing but tarnishing names without having any morality,” Bommai told reporters on Saturday.
Those close to Bommai claim that the chief minister is deeply upset with his name being repeatedly associated with corruption when many of the allegations — on whose basis the Congress is attacking him — preceded his time in office. Bommai replaced BS Yediyurappa in 2021 as chief minister.
“The Congress always targets major communities with smear campaigns. This is not the first time. Targeting chief ministers of majority communities have always been their approach,” Sudhakar reiterated on Saturday.
The Bommai team hopes to achieve two goals with this counter.
The first is that they hope that this pits the Congress’ campaign against the politically influential Lingayat community to achieve a sense of “one among us is being targeted” within the Lingayats.
Another is to elevate Bommai’s stature within the community to suggest that an insult to Bommai was an insult to the whole community.
Ever since he replaced Yediyurappa — the tallest Lingayat leader in Karnataka — Bommai has been struggling to emerge as an alternative.
The Congress, however, deems it the BJP’s go-to trick.
“Whenever the BJP is cornered on real issues, it brings out the community cards. It hasn’t spared any community when it comes to corruption,” Priyank Kharge, chairman, KPCC Communication, told South First.
The former minister also sought to know why the BJP didn’t think twice about dislodging BS Yediyurappa.
“Nobody came to his defence when he shed a tear while losing the chief minister’s chair. Why didn’t any BJP leader come forward to speak when Santosh Patil — a Lingayat — lost his life to the BJP’s corrupt antics? Where were they when a Lingayat seer accused the government of taking 30 percent commission? This community card is just to appease people,” Kharge added.
It isn’t just leaders of the Congress in Karnataka or the TRS in Telangana. Bommai’s government came under sharp criticism from even Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan. Addressing a public gathering — the first of its kind in decades for the CPI(M) in Karnataka — earlier last week, Vijayan went after the BJP and the RSS in Karnataka.
“Communal forces have converted Karnataka into a communal laboratory like some North Indian states, and in that process they have given the state a bad name. The Sangh Parivar is pushing forward different communal agendas targeting minorities and it is hellbent on saffronising the next generation through saffronisation of textbooks,” Vijayan said, taking a swipe at the Bommai government’s textbook committee.
Even as he faces taunts from Opposition parties within Karnataka and outside, Basavaraj Bommai has been receiving little support from his cabinet ministers as well as the BJP in Karnataka.
The party’s counter to the Congress’ anti-corruption campaign was releasing on Friday a booklet listing out alleged scams under the Siddaramaiah government.
