Bengaluru: Baburao Chinchansur, the Congress leader who was seen as being instrumental in the defeat of the now-party president Mallikarjun Kharge in the 2019 general election, is one of 42 candidates who has been given a party ticket for the Karnataka assembly elections.
Chinchansur, a five-time MLA who was once considered close to Kharge, is the Congress candidate from the Gurmitkal assembly seat.
The Congress’s latest list of candidates brings its total to 166. Candidates for the remaining 58 seats in the 224-member assembly are yet to be decided.
Chinchansur had played a key role in the defeat of Mallikarjun Kharge in his stronghold Kalburgi in 2019. Until that year, Kharge was called ‘Solillada Saradara (Kannada for a leader who has never been defeated)’, having been undefeated in 11 elections — nine assembly polls and two general elections.
Chinchansur, with leaders such as Malikayya Guttedar and Umesh Jadhav, was considered part of Kharge’s inner circle. He served as a minister in the Siddaramaiah government from 2013 to 2016.
In 2018, however, he quit the party and joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The revolt came on the back of Kharge’s son Priyank’s rise within the party.
After Jadhav followed him out in 2019 and contested the Lok Sabha election from Kalburgi as a BJP candidate, Chinchasur campaigned for him — a move that has been seen as having tipped the poll in the former’s favour.
While rejoining the Congress last month, Chinchansur said that the Kalyana Karnataka region “is a bastion of Kharge”. “The BJP is trying hard to make a breakthrough,” Chinchansur had said then.
A Congress legislator told ThePrint on the condition of anonymity that the party was being “very cautious” with its list.
“Chinchansur campaigned against Mr Kharge but he never got personal in his attacks like Mallikayya and Jadhav. He would have lost on a BJP ticket but will win with a Congress ticket,” the leader said.
Karnataka will vote for its 224-member assembly on 10 May. Votes will be counted on 13 May.
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New candidates’ list
The Congress appears to be taking its time to release its list of candidates — party sources told ThePrint that intense debates, discussions, and negotiations continue within the top leadership of the party.
Among the candidates whose names have already been released is former chief minister Siddaramaiah, who will contest the elections from Varuna. However, the candidate for Kolar, the seat that the leader had reportedly been keen on, has yet to be decided — a development that has sparked speculation that, like in 2018, he would contest from two seats.
The former chief minister had contested two seats in 2018 — Badami and Chamundershwari, another one of his old assembly seats — but won only the former by a narrow margin.
While Siddaramaiah, one of the party’s tallest leaders in Karnataka and a potential chief ministerial candidate, remains keen on Kolar, the Congress’s internal surveys have indicated that it could be risky.
Meanwhile, the party announced Thursday that B.B. Chimmanakatti will contest the election from Badami and S.R. Srinivas, the Janata Dal (Secular) rebel who joined the Congress on 31 March, from Gubbi, considered his stronghold.
Among the controversial names released was Vinay Kulkarni, a former Congress MLA who’s a key accused in the 2016 murder of Yogesh Gowda Goudar, a member of the district Panchayat and a BJP worker. Kulkarni has been named the party’s candidate from Dharwad.
Goudar was hacked to death on 15 June 2016, in Dharwad. Kulkarni was a minister at the time of the attack and was arrested on 5 November 2020.
While granting him bail in 2021, the Supreme Court said he should stay out of Dharwad. Flouting this condition could land him back in jail.
When asked about it, Karnataka Chief Minister and BJP leader Basavaraj Bommai said it was “Congress’s decision” to field Kulkarni.
“The remaining issues are with the court. I won’t comment on it. People will decide,” Bommai told reporters Thursday.
More crossovers?
The Congress is expecting more crossovers from the ruling BJP over the next few days, its party leaders have said several times.
The party’s strategy to focus on winning the elections at all costs, even if it means accommodating new entrants and overlooking old-timers and women, has led to disgruntlement within the party, one officebearer of the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee told ThePrint on the condition of anonymity.
Ticket distribution has even led to protests outside the Congress’s office in Bengaluru.
“There are at least 50-60 constituencies where new entrants into the party are being given preference over long-time party workers,” the officebearer said.
ThePrint reached at least three senior Congress leaders by phone for their comments on the anger around ticket distribution. This report will be updated when they respond.
(Edited by Uttara Ramaswamy)
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