Hemmed in by high-profile desertions that threaten its tradition Lingayat support base and underwhelming performance of the incumbent government, the BJP is pulling out its famed arsenal for the upcoming Karnataka Assembly polls – Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s week-long campaign tour starting April 28 and video-conference flashed across 6,000 centres on April 26.

BJP sources said the PM’s last-minute push to revive the party’s flagging prospects is preceded by “carpet bombing” the election-bound State with a spate of rallies and road shows by all national and State leaders of the party.

“On April 25 and 26, a national and State leader will be present in all 224 constituencies of the state. A day before that, party president J. P. Nadda is addressing road shows in Chikkaballapur and Hosakote (Bengaluru Roral). Amit Shahjee has been here. Our campaign has just picked up,” said BJP sources.

PM has committed seven days for rallies and road shows from April 28 till the last day of campaigning. He will be addressing about 2-3 rallies and road shows in a day.

Star power

The BJP desperately needs the PM’s star power to pull it out of the morass that a spate of desertions and dispirited performance of its local government has created. The biggest problem that the party is currently facing is the narrative of “Brahmin domination” that the influence of its national general secretary B. L. Santosh and Union Minister Prahlad Joshi has created.

Lingayats’ votes key

The BJP has largely built its support base around the powerful Lingayats who form about 17 per cent of the electorate. But the perception that the community’s tallest leader, former Chief Minister B. S. Yeddiyurappa, was initially sidelined and strained to get his son, B. Y. Vijayendra, a ticket from his traditional seat Shikaripura, coupled with the desertions by former CM Jagdish Shettar and former Deputy CM Laxman Savadi, has built a narrative that the BJP is favouring Brahmins over the numerically powerful Lingayats.

The issue is particularly troublesome for the party in the Bombay Karnataka region, specifically in the Bagalkot, Vijayapura, Belagavi, Hubbli-Dharwad districts. The BJP had done well in this region in the 2018 Assembly elections but will need a strong push that it hopes will come from the PM who remains popular with the voters.

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“Despite the Congress’s anti-incumbency in the last elections, we managed just 104 seats. This time, we have our own government and all these issues have surfaced. We have been focusing on expanding in areas that have not been traditionally our strongholds, such as the Old Mysuru-Southern Karnataka belt but the JD(S) will have its strong base as will the pockets of Congress influence. I think the last 15 days will be very crucial. We are depending a lot on what PM and Amit Shahji can manage,” a BJP leader said.

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