Karnataka CM banks on Lingayat card

BANGALORE: B S Yeddyurappa’s confidence in defying BJP central leadership stems from his trump card: he is a Lingayat. Wounded and hurt, Lingayat leaders have in past meant trouble for Karnataka politics. They have stirred up emotions resulting in vengeful politics.
That’s because Lingayats constitute 22% of Karnataka’s 5.5 crore population. They have considerable influence in 80 of 224 assembly constituencies, especially, in northern parts of the state.The community made its presence felt first when S Nijalingappa became CM in 1956. Nijalingappa’s successors were Lingayats — B D Jatti in 1958 and S R Kanti in 1962. Nijalingappa returned for another term between 1962 and 1968. Veerendra Patil succeeded him.
After Patil’s term ended in 1971, there was a long gap with CM’s post going to backward classes (D Devaraj Urs) and two Brahmins (R Gundu Rao and Ramakrishna Hegde). S R Bommai emerged on the scene for a brief stint in 1988 and Yeddyurappa two decades later.
At least two instances of Lingayat CMs’ terms getting cut short midway either because of dissidence or directions from Delhi has made the community prickly about political parties. The first casualty was Congress after an ailing Patil was removed unceremoniously in 1990.
The community switched loyalty from Congress to Janata Parivar under former CM Ramakrishna Hegde and later Bommai. The splinter Janata factions made them turn to the BJP, an alliance that firmed up when former CM H D Kumaraswamy refused to transfer power to Yeddyurappa in 2007.