Ashok Kumar Rai, Congress candidate for Puttur Assembly Constituency submitting his nomination papers in Puttur.
| Photo Credit: Special Arrangement
Even as the BJP’s many experiments together with that of fielding V. Somanna in Varuna and Chamarajanagar miserably failed, the get together offered Puttur, the Hindutva stronghold in Dakshina Kannada, on a platter to the Congress.
While Hindutva activist Arun Kumar Puthila was a robust contender for the BJP ticket, the get together not solely denied the ticket to the incumbent, Sanjeev Matandur, however fielded Asha Thimmappa, a comparatively light-weight candidate from Puttur. Ashok Kumar Rai, a businessman and philanthropist, who earlier had recognized himself with the Sangh Parivar, turned the Congress candidate.
The BJP’s efforts to woo voters by bringing in stalwarts, together with Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, its nationwide president J.P. Nadda and others and the ‘fatwa’ by native RSS chief Kalladka Prabhakar Bhat, failed to translate into votes for Ms. Thimmappa, who was relegated to the third place.
On the different hand, virtually each BJP supporter chanted the identify of Mr. Puthila, who contested as an Independent candidate, whereas many contributed to his election expenditure upon an attraction by the candidate.
As per the newest traits, Mr. Rai of the Congress had polled 64,687 votes (38.38% of 1,68,542 complete polled), Mr. Puthila 61336 (36.39%) votes and Ms. Thimmappa of the BJP had polled 36256 (21.67%) votes. If Mr. Puthila was fielded as the BJP candidate, the Party might simply have received the polls by securing not lower than 90,000 votes towards the Congress candidate.
A Sangh Parivar employee, who didn’t want to be recognized, alleged that a senior BJP chief was adamant that Mr. Puthila shouldn’t be given the ticket and the Party ought to subject a weak candidate in order to assist his old-time buddy Mr. Rai to win the election.
Incidentally, the BJP state president Nalin Kumar Kateel represents Dakshina Kannada in the Lok Sabha, of which Puttur meeting constituency is a half. Puttur had elected the Congress candidates from 1952 to 1972; elected Urimajalu Okay Rama Bhat in 1978 as the Janata Party candidate and in 1983 as the BJP candidate, elected Vinay Kumar Sorake of the Congress in 1985 and 1989; former chief minister D.V. Sadananda Gowda of the BJP in 1994 and 1999; Shakunthala T. Shetty as the BJP candidate in 2004; Mallika Prasad as the BJP candidate in 2008; Shakunthala T Shetty as the Congress candidate in 2013 and Mr. Matandoor of the BJP in 2018.
Ms. Shetty rebelled towards the BJP after she was denied the ticket in 2008 and contested as an Independent candidate with the assist of Mr. Rama Bhat, who was credited to be the BJP patriarch in the coast, solely to lose to Ms. Prasad. The BJP had argued that the candidate was just for namesake whereas the Party was supreme whereas fielding Ms. Thimmappa this time.
