In a well calculated move, the BJP in Karnataka has fielded its tallest Valmiki (Nayaka) community leader and sitting Bellary MP B. Sriramulu from Molkalmuru assembly constituency in Chitradurga, to directly strike at the Ahinda (minorities, dalits and backward classes) vote base, carefully nurtured by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah.
Sriramulu, a close aide of Reddy Brothers of Bellary, has been moved out of his hometurf Bellary to the neighbouring Chitradurga, which is a strategic seat to create a ripple effect in the ST belt and galvanise the tribal votes towards the BJP. The saffron party is hoping to ride on the huge popularity of Sriramulu to consolidate the ST votes, spread across the 15 ST reserved seats in Chitradurga, Davangere, Mysore, Bellary, Raichur, Yadgir and Belagavi districts.
This is the second significant move of the BJP to woo to the ST community after the Union cabinet recently approved the inclusion of “Talwara” and “Parivara” (synonyms to Nayakas) into the list of Scheduled Tribes (STs) in Karnataka. This inclusion is believed to pull the ST votes in Mysuru and Chamarajnagar districts, as it also establishes the historical context too. Parivara and Talawara are references to the Nayaka clan of the Chitradurga. They were captured by Hyder Ali who seized the Chitradurga Fort in 1779 (after three failed attempts) and imprisoned Madakari Nayaka, the feudal king. Hyder Ali, in order to break the power of the Nayakas (Bedar caste), moved them out to Srirangapana and inducted them into his army.
Interestingly, the ST communities started gravitating towards the BJP after the Siddaramaiah government introduced state-wide celebrations of Tipu Jayanti in 2015. The move angered the Nayaka community in Chitradurga, as Hyder Ali (Tipu's father) is believed to have poisoned Madakari Nayaka to death.
The recent visit of Amit Shah to Chitradurga to address a massive ST convention, his gesture of garlanding the statue of Madakari Nayaka, and giving assurance of building a memorial for the feudal king, has sent positive vibes to the community, claim BJP sources.
The BJP, which started making inroads into the ST bastions, had given three cabinet berths to ST community—B Sriramulu, Balachandra Jarkiholi and Raju Gouda—in 2008. But Siddaramaiah inducted a sole member (Ramesh Jarkiholi) into his cabinet.
Who is Sriramulu?
Sriramulu commands a sizeable vote bank, as he represents the ST community that accounts for seven per cent of the state's population.
In 2011, Sriramulu, who was Bellary Rural MLA, quit the BJP after being dropped from the cabinet. He was also upset with the “ill treatment” meted out to his mentor and mining baron G. Janaradhana Reddy, following his indictment in the illegal mining scam. Sriramulu won the byelection by a huge margin of 48,000 votes, causing a huge embarrassment to the BJP, which was pushed to the third place. Enthused by the victory, he floated his own party, Badavara Shramikara Raitara Congress (BSR Congress), which won only four seats, grabbing a voteshare of 2.81 per cent in the 2013 assembly polls. But it dented the BJP votes across six to seven districts. Simultaneously, a disgruntled B.S. Yeddyurappa, who had stepped down as CM over corruption charges, had floated the Karnataka Janata Party.
In the 2013 assembly polls, both the splinter parties cut into the BJP vote, reducing the party to a mere 40 seats. The BJP's vote share, which was 34.29 per cent in 2008, was reduced to 20.12 per cent, as KJP got 9.98 per cent and BSR Congress 2.81 per cent.
Ahead of the 2014 Parliament election, both Yeddyurappa and Sriramulu came back into the BJP fold. The party welcomed Sriramulu and fielded him from the Bellary Lok Sabha constituency amid strong opposition from Sushma Swaraj, who till then had a good rapport with him.
In 1999, when Sushma Swaraj contested the Lok Sabha from Bellary against the then AICC chief Sonia Gandhi, Sriramulu, had been her local aide. However, the senior leader distanced herself from Sriramulu and the Reddy Brothers, after their names figured in the mining scam.
Today, Sriramulu has emerged as a successful leader within the BJP, and perhaps out of the shadow of his mentor G. Janardhana Reddy, who is out on bail, but restrained from entering Bellary. Interestingly, the BJP central leadership, which had ruled out giving the assembly tickets to sitting MPs except Yeddyurappa, seems to have made an exception in Sriramulu's case, owing to his ability to catch ST votes.