Karnataka polls: Congress fielded 46 Lingayats, 37 won

The battle for the Vokkaliga vote has yielded a new chieftain. In a strong electoral riposte to those who had questioned his emergence as the face of the community, Karnataka PCC chief DK Shivakumar proved his mettle Saturday by leading Congress to victory in 30 of the 61 seats spread across seven districts comprising the Old Mysuru region.

That these wins came at the cost of the H D Kumaraswamy-led JD(S), whose tally hit an all-time low of 19, tells the sorry tale of a regional party that relied overly on its Vokkaliga clout over two decades and failed to expand its reach.

While JD(S) stuck to its playbook, Congress's strategy of allocating tickets to strong local politicians and giving credible turncoats their due, coupled with the counter-consolidation of Muslim votes in favour of the party, ensured JD(S) got left behind in the race.

Congress also reduced BJP to a further low in the region by wresting five of the six seats that the saffron party lost.

For JD(S), which held all seven seats in Mandya district, losing five of these to Congress and one to Congress-backed independent Darshan Puttannaiah would have accentuated the hurt. Ramanagara and Mysuru threw up similar outcomes, with JD(S) being left with three of 11 seats - a steep decline from its 2018 tally of seven.

In Bengaluru rural, where JD(S) had two seats, it was a wipeout. The silver lining for the party was retaining four of the seven seats at stake in its bastion of Hassan district. It had won six in 2018.



The overall setback puts the very survival of JD(S) in question. The war of words between the families of siblings Kumaraswamy and H D Revanna in the run-up to the elections could intensify, especially over the defeat of the former's son Nikhil on home turf Ramanagara.