BJP To Tie Up With HD Deve Gowda’s JDS For 2024 Election: BS Yediyurappa
According to BJP leader and ex-Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa, the JDS will contest four of the state's 28 parliamentary seats despite having won less than 10 per cent of the votes in the last general election
The Bharatiya Janata Party has an “understanding” with the Janata Dal (Secular) for the 2024 Lok Sabha election, ex-Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa said Friday morning. The senior BJP leader was quoted by news agency PTI as saying the JDS will contest four seats.
Sources indicate the JDS wants the Mandya, Hassan, Bengaluru (Rural) and Chikballapur seats, of which the BJP won three in the 2019 Lok Sabha election; the JDS won only Hassan.
JDS patriarch HD Deve Gowda contested the Tumkur seat and lost (to a BJP candidate). His grandson Nikhil Kumaraswamy, ex-Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy’s son lost.
In fact, the JDS won less than 10 per cent of the total voteshare in the 2019 polls, underlining the significance of this alliance for the smaller party, particularly after it was also trounced in the state election; Mr Deve Gowda’s outfit secured less than 14 per cent of the votes polled.
The tie-up is also key for the BJP as it looks to counter momentum being generated by INDIA, the mega opposition bloc that includes the Congress, the Trinamool, the Aam Aadmi Party, the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam, the Shiv Sena UBT and several more.
The BJP was in power in the southern state till the Assembly election in May, in which the Congress recorded a dominant win, claiming 135 seats in the 224-member house.
In June sources told of the possibility of a fresh alliance between the BJP and JDS.
Days later JDS boss HD Deve Gowda publicly backed Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw after the train tragedy in Odisha’s Balasore; Mr Deve Gowda praised Mr Vaishnaw for “working tirelessly (and had taken) all necessary steps to restore damage.
Mr Deve Gowda had also spurned some opposition leaders’ calls to boycott the inauguration of the new Parliament building in May. “I am attending inauguration of the new Parliament building. It is the property of the country. It is not anyone’s personal matter,” he had said.
