Bengaluru: No prime minister has done as much for Bengaluru’s infrastructure as Narendra Modi, says Tejasvi Surya, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP from Bengaluru South and national president of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM).
In an interview with ThePrint’s D.K. Singh and Sharan Poovanna, the 32-year-old speaks about why the BJP will “100 per cent” retain power in Karnataka, how Basavaraj Bommai has performed well as chief minister, how the Congress and the Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI) — and not the BJP — created the Tipu Sultan and hijab/halal issues, and also about his own image as a ‘Hindutva firebrand’.
The election to the 224-member Karnataka assembly will be held on 10 May, and the counting of votes will take place on 13 May.
DK: We have been looking at surveys done by different agencies, and the BJP is supposedly lagging. The surveys are giving either a fractured verdict or a lead to the Congress. What’s your take on that?
TS: I have travelled to at least 50-60 constituencies in Karnataka and spent quite a lot of time on the ground talking to our karyakartas (workers), influential voters, and the general public, and have sensed the pulse on the ground. I can tell you with certainty that all these surveys and reports that you mentioned will fall flat on 13 May when the real electors will speak.
For the last three-and-a-half years, the state has seen unprecedented development brought by the BJP government. It has indeed touched the lives of people directly. And only on that basis of that confidence, I can tell you that the BJP will very comfortably sail through the halfway mark. The next government in Karnataka is going to be a BJP government 100 per cent.
DK: You talk about governance and performance under Bommai but the BJP has not announced him as the CM candidate. Why this ambivalence?
TS: I see this ambivalence only with you and political commentators. I don’t see this ambivalence within the party, karyakartas nor with the general public. Mr Bommai is our very well-performing chief minister. He has solved and addressed some of the most important legacy issues of the state. It was under his leadership that issues like internal reservations, pending for decades, finally got addressed in a very politically dexterous manner and sensitive manner. He has been the CM who has brought in great development by clearing projects like the Upper Bhadra project and the Mahadayi project.
He ensured that the city of Bengaluru gets the long-pending suburban rail project, the infrastructure for Bengaluru city is developed under his leadership, and the ‘Beyond Bengaluru’ development initiative, which is a very important policy approach of the government, has got an impetus.
So, in fact, the leadership that the prime minister has given to the country at the Centre and the complementing leadership that is very much needed at the state level has been provided by Mr Bommai. He is the CM face today, and he’s a leader of the state BJP for today and for tomorrow as well.
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‘BJP a cadre-based party, not leader-based’
DK: We have seen 10 BJP MLAs and MLCs quit the party and join others. There are BJP workers protesting over ticket distribution. Senior leaders like Jagadish Shettar and Laxman Savadi have also quit…
TS: The BJP is a cadre-based party and not a leader-based party. As long as the cadre is strong, there is nothing for the BJP to worry about, and I can give you in writing that in all these seats that you mentioned, the BJP is going to emerge victorious, because the cadre in all of these seats remains more inspired and more charged than ever before.
DK: You’re saying that removing B.S. Yediyurappa (as CM) is not going to impact the party…?
TS: This whole terminology of saying removed is itself something that I take very strong objection to. It is only in the BJP, where you have the practice of senior leaders voluntarily making space and grooming the next generation of leadership. And in Karnataka, this practice, parampara, tradition has been led by none other than our tallest leaders like Yediyurappa.
We have seen how gracefully K.S. Eshwarappa has groomed the next generation of leadership there. In the same way you see all across the country, senior leaders are making way for the next generation of leaders. Because this is again going back to our core principle that a cadre-based party and leaders are groomed from among the cadre. You can mention 15 names in the BJP who can be the second, third and fourth generation of leaders. Whereas you will not be able to mention such names in the Congress party or any of the dynasty-based parties across the country. Removing anybody is not a part of the BJP culture.
About Yediyurappa, he voluntarily gave up contesting elections but to be a leader in the BJP, one does not need to have an electoral post or win elections. This position is something that is very difficult for people outside the BJP ecosystem to even understand, let alone digest.
DK: You say that the party promotes next-generation leaders but you are missing from the BJPs star campaigners’ list.
TS: Because I’m not any star. I am a very normal karyakarta. As an MP of Bangalore South, there are five assembly constituencies in my constituency which do not have the physical presence of a BJP MLA today, the responsibility of which falls on my shoulders. Not being in the star campaigners’ list is an issue for the media. For party and party karyakartas, none of these is an issue at all.
DK: The fact that many young leaders like Pratap Simha, B.Y. Vijayendra and you are not on this list…
TS: Because none of us is a star. Simha, Raghavendra, Vijayendra, Kudachi MLA P. Rajeev… are all young leaders of the party and functioning on the ground. Therefore the party has perhaps not put us on the star campaigners list because the party wants us to utilise our resources and energy in different activities. Like I said, this is a non-issue for the BJP, but it is an important issue for ThePrint. I even remember you wrote a long article about this.
‘Religion-based quota constitutional anomaly’
SP: The Vokkaligas and Lingayats have rejected the reservation formula given by the state government. You have also stripped Muslims of their reservation quota. Do you think this is legally tenable?
TS: What existed all these days in Karnataka, in my humble opinion, was a constitutional anomaly. The 4 per cent reservation based only on religion that existed from 1994 is an unconstitutional practice and existed unhindered. We have now tried to remove this constitutional anomaly and bring in real social justice by allotting that reservation to people who really deserve it. So the question, rather, should be to those who practised this so far as to why they practised something so blatantly unconstitutional. Was it done only to strengthen somebody’s vote banks?
SP: The BJP was in power between 2008 and 2013. Why was it not done then?
TS: That’s what I’m telling you. That even all these days, the fact that it remained was something wrong and the moment we got to know that this a constitutional anomaly, it had to be set right. We have done that.
DK: The general impression is that the BJP scrapped the Muslim quota and is harping on Tipu Sultan.
TS: The BJP has not been harping about Tipu Sultan. The very first time somebody made Tipu Sultan a hero in Karnataka and brought this issue to public debate was Mr Siddaramaiah by celebrating Tipu Jayanthi. The BJP speaks of development. They (Congress) speak of Tipu Jayanthi. If you have seen any of our debates, speeches, it has been a reaction to this issue of celebrating a tyrant. He is in this, he’s in the middle of a debate only because the Congress party deemed fit to celebrate him using state funds. Our response was a reaction and the BJP did not invent this issue.
DK: A few weeks ago, Siddaramaiah told us that Tipu is a freedom fighter and the BJP should read history…
TS: The people of Karnataka who have lived here have memories of the trauma that has been associated with Tipu Sultan’s rule. Please go to Madikeri, talk to people there about what their civilisational memory is about Tipu Sultan. Meet Mandyam Iyengars in Srirangapatna and ask them about their memory, (rather) than Mr. Siddaramaiah or me or any historian because they (Kodavas and Mandyam Iyengars) have literally seen his rule. Their ancestors have been killed or maimed. They have lost their houses and temples, properties vandalised. History should never be subjected to political prejudices and political agendas. History should be nothing but truth and only the truth.
DK: You are portrayed as the Hindutva face, firebrand and anti-Muslim. Do you agree with that projection?
TS: I do not actually place too much importance on this projection of media and the media-created image. I am a very committed karyakarta and have been one from the time I started reading Swami Vivekananda, Sri Aurobindo, (V.D.) Savarkar, and such other ideological leaders, I’m a very simple character who does not shy away from wearing my convictions up my sleeve, and the media wants to project it in certain way.
I feel that the media, including ThePrint, has not been very accurate in presenting even the position that I have taken. I honestly believe that our work that connects to people, the work that we do every day that touches the lives of people in my constituency, the work that I do within the party, in the capacity of the Yuva Morcha (national president), which is seen by our leadership, which is seen by our peers, that is more important than the certificates that any external agency ever hands over.
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‘No dichotomy between economic & cultural growth‘
DK: So what you’re saying is your priority is development, not any ideological pursuit?
TS: You are trying to say that development and ideology are two very different things. For the BJP, or at least for me, I can tell you that the growth of Bharat is both the cultural growth of Bharat as well as its economic growth. Therefore, this whole artificial dichotomy that certain commentators try to bring in by saying that development and cultural growth are two different parallel tracks is something that I do not agree with at all.
When we speak of vishwaguru (world leader) Bharat, a civilisationally resurgent India, it is an India that is strong… economically, militarily, spiritually… in every way. And that is the large vision that inspires all of us — the Sangh, the BJP, the countless karyakartas like me — to work.
SP: You speak about this vision of the BJP but minorities continue to feel more and more isolated now…
TS: Who brought all these issues up? Even in this debate, I wanted to speak on how we have been able to clear the suburban rail project, pending from 40 years, how we have solved the internal reservation issue and truly in short, social justice.
We are here going to people telling them that this is the state government which has taken development truly outside of Bengaluru through the ‘Beyond Bengaluru’ campaign, so much so that in the recently concluded Global Investor Summit in Bengaluru, 90 per cent of the committed investment came outside of Bengaluru. These are the issues with which we are going to the people in my own constituency of Bengaluru.
Bengaluru is India’s fastest growing city and growth engine of the south of India. We have celebrated the legacy of Kempe Gowda and Basaveshwara, one of the biggest, respected cultural icons of Karnataka. So, for us, there is no dichotomy between material growth, economic growth and the cultural growth of civilisation. It is all interlinked because our view is very integral but wholesome.
The issue of Tipu Sultan was brought up by the Congress. Hijab was started by the SDPI. The issue of Nandini and milk was again started by the Congress. While the Congress is trying to harp on issues that will divide the state, we are here trying to take development in (accordance with) the mantra of the prime minister — Sabka Saath Sabka Vikas — because people are seeing this difference very clearly. And on 10 May, the people of Karnataka are going to reward the BJP handsomely for the development that we have already brought about, and the promise and the hope that the BJP is promising for the next five years of shared prosperity and fast-paced development of Karnataka.
DK: There is so much talk about the crumbling infrastructure in Bengaluru and the mess of a city it has become….
TS: I want to address this head on. I feel that I’m not saying this as an MP of Bengaluru, I’m saying this as a person who has grown up in Bengaluru and who loves the city to bits. I have travelled to all important cities in India, and I can tell you that compared to many other cities, Bengaluru traffic is not as horrible as many others. But unfortunately a whole stereotype has been attached, and it is unjustified many times, almost making it a ritual. Somebody gets off a flight at Bengaluru airport and immediately puts out a tweet saying that they are stuck in ‘Bangalore traffic’. It’s as though it’s a culture that somebody has to follow.
In the last 30 years, the city has seen unprecedented development. The economic growth of the city and the infrastructure growth of the city perhaps have not in all honesty met with each other and have not been corresponding. The central government before the Narendra Modi government was only simply approving important infrastructure projects for Bengaluru. I am 32 years old and the Bengaluru Suburban Rail Project proposal is 40 years old. What were the earlier governments doing? The earlier suburban parts have now become urban because of the 40-year delay. I can tell you that no prime minister in the history of India has done as much to Bengaluru infrastructure as Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The Satellite Township Road Project, pending for many years, is now being taken up by NHAI (National Highways Authority of India) on a war footing and Rs 15,000 crore has been sanctioned. Metro connectivity has increased from 7 km before 2014 to 70 now, and it will be 100 by next year. It was in 2019 that the prime minister came and laid the foundation for Bengaluru’s second airport terminal. The BMTC (Bengaluru Metropolitan Transport Corporation) fleet has been increased with more EVs and other buses.
Bengaluru is the hub for many industrial corridors, connecting to Chennai, Visakhapatnam, Pune, Hyderabad… All of this is going to transform the infrastructure of the city as we know it today. The International Monetary Fund has projected Bengaluru to be the world’s fastest-growing city for the next 15 years. And I can very confidently tell you that thanks to the prime minister’s contribution to all of these infrastructure creation, Bengaluru will be the fastest growing engine of growth for India in the coming years.
SP: Finally, we would like to know about your poll prediction for 13 May.
TS: The BJP will be forming the government on13 May with a comfortable majority. And it will be 100 per cent on our own strength.
(Edited by Anumeha Saxena)
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