Janata Dal (Secular) (JD(S)) president H.D. Kumaraswamy attended a school event in Mangalore last month. It was not an ordinary school event. The school is run by the Sri Rama Vidya Kendra Trust, itself run by RSS functionary Kalladka Prabhakar Bhat, a rabid rabble rouser known for his communally charged statements.
The same school also came in the news in December 2019, when its students were made to re-enact the demolition of the Babri Masjid.
At the school event, Kumaraswamy gave a speech eulogising Bhat and commending his efforts in providing value-based education to students and inculcating native culture, tradition and heritage in them. He also regretted his earlier statements critical of Bhat and ended his speech by saying “Jai Shree Ram”.
He said: “I express my deep regret for criticism in the past, which was based on what some people had told me intending to mislead me. This visit today has transformed me.”
Master of U-turns
This is not the first time that Kumaraswamy had a “change of mind”. His mind seems to take a U-turn once every few years, especially when elections are around the corner.
In February 2023, Kumaraswamy raised a storm when he attacked the RSS during an interaction with the media, saying, “The RSS wants to make Pralhad Joshi, who does not belong to Karnataka culture, as Karnataka chief minister”, and went on to claim that Joshi belonged to the Peshwa community, which he described as indulging in “conspiracy politics” and “[massacring] those who contributed to the country in the name of patriotism”.
Kumaraswamy appealed to all communities not to fall prey to the conspiracy by the BJP and the RSS that would divide the country. He said during an earlier interview that Karnataka and the country were in the RSS’s grip and that he had deeply studied the RSS’s workings. He also said he was reading the book The RSS: And the Making of the Deep Nation by Dinesh Narayanan.
Many had attacked him for being the ‘B-team’ of the BJP and said his statements were meant only to divide the Muslim vote in the upcoming by-polls.
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For the 2023 Karnataka assembly polls, the JD(S) fielded 22 Muslim candidates. It also vowed to restore the 4% reservation for Muslims that was revoked by the Basavaraj Bommai government. But it now seems that Muslim voters saw through Kumaraswamy’s “secular” facade and voted en masse for the Congress.
All 22 candidates were defeated and many even lost their deposit. The JD(S) was wiped out in the elections. This is despite it having enjoyed support from the Muslim community in the Old Mysore region.
The Congress won 41 of the 61 seats across seven districts that are part of the region. Its victories came at the cost of the JD(S), and D.K. Shivakumar emerged as the new Vokkaliga strongman.
The JD(S) also paved the way for the BJP on its own in the Vokkaliga belt in this election. Of the just over one crore votes polled in 61 seats in the region, the BJP polled 24,60,429 votes – just six lakh less than the JD(S)’s 30,35,584 votes, the Times of India reported.
The party’s dismal performance not only put a question mark on Kumaraswamy’s leadership, but on the very existence of the JD(S).
Question of survival
Kumaraswamy blamed the party’s defeat on Muslims and allied with the BJP for the 2024 election within four months. He also hinted at the possibility of another “Operation Lotus” in Karnataka.
Two Muslim leaders quit the party over its decision to ally with the BJP. Syed Shafiullah, state vice president of the JD(S), said the party stood on principles of secularism while the BJP “preaches, propagates and acts on [a] communal agenda”.
In his typical pettiness, Kumaraswamy questioned the contributions of Muslim leaders to his party.
It is said that H.D. Deve Gowda, Kumaraswamy’s father and the party’s former chief, believes that by rallying its original support base behind the BJP, the JD(S) can rejuvenate its electoral gains; but it might end up bolstering the BJP in its own bastion. Now, with the JD(S)’s support, the BJP might in 2024 achieve its distant dream of gaining a foothold in the Mysore belt.
Kumaraswamy’s changing stance is known in political circles and he is euphemistically called “kingmaker” during every election in Karnataka. During the 2023 assembly election, when asked if he will be the kingmaker after the polls in the event of a fractured mandate, Kumaraswamy replied pompously that he will be the king.
Secular kingmaker to (saffron) pawn
It’s not that Kumaraswamy is a sudden neo-convert and is doubling down on the Hindutva plank. The Kumaraswamy-led JD(S) has hobnobbed with the BJP earlier too, having formed the government twice since its inception in 1999 as a breakaway faction from the Janata Dal. Gathering its strength from the Vokkaliga belt in southern Karnataka, the JD(S) has been playing the role of kingmaker since 2004.
In the 2004 election, the JD(S) backed the Congress in a post-poll alliance, following which Dharam Singh became chief minister of Karnataka. Within 21 months, though, the JD(S) pulled out its support and the Dharam Singh government collapsed.
Kumaraswamy shifted his support to the BJP and became chief minister of Karnataka with the help of B.S. Yediyurappa in a power sharing agreement, according to which Kumaraswamy would be chief minister for the first 20 months followed by Yediyurappa for the remaining 20 months.
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Yediyurappa became deputy chief minister as well as finance minister in Kumaraswamy’s government.
However, after 20 months, Kumaraswamy refused to relinquish his post. Deve Gowda and the JD(S) also supported his decision. He did resign some days later and Yediyurappa was made chief minister on November 12, 2007.
But Kumaraswamy again withdrew his support, leading to the government’s collapse within a week of its formation. This is the first time the BJP came close to forming a government in Karnataka.
Early elections were called in 2008 and Yediyurappa, riding the sympathy wave of the CM’s post being snatched away from him, made a big comeback and emerged as chief minister and a powerful Lingayat leader. It was a historical victory for the BJP under Yediyurappa’s leadership and the party made its entry in South India on its own.
A similar situation occurred in the 2018 assembly election in the state, where no party won a majority. The Congress and the JD(S) formed a post-poll alliance and earned a majority, following which Kumaraswamy was sworn in as chief minister for the second time. After one year, his government lost its majority when 13 MLAs of the Congress and three MLAs of the JD(S) resigned in “Operation Lotus”.
The BJP then formed a government with Yediyurappa at its helm.
The demise of the Janata Party: From alternative politics to question of existence?
In 2006, when Kumaraswamy formed the government with the BJP, famous Kannada writer Dr U.R. Ananthamurthy had questioned the JD(S)’s secular credentials. Kumaraswamy had famously asked who Dr Ananthamurthy was and what secularism meant.
This dilly-dallying on secularism is not unique to Kumaraswamy. It has been a characteristic of parties associated with the Janata Party. The Janata Party was formed in 1977 to oppose the Emergency imposed by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, with the Jana Sangh (which later formed the BJP) as one of its significant constituent parties.
The Janata Party came to power in seven states, namely Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Haryana, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh. But over the years, opportunism, a weak secular rhetoric, family-centred politics and over-reliance on specific caste groups have led to the slow demise of the kind of “alternative politics” symbolised by the party.
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Several of the constituent parties and their leaders later aligned with the BJP to form coalition governments over the years and apparently had no problem with the BJP’s communal rhetoric, with Ram Vilas Paswan being a prime example of such a politics. He was referred to as the weatherman of Indian politics due to his flip-flops from one alliance to another to be in power or a ministership.
Nitish Kumar of the JD(U), who had a strong base among Muslims in Bihar and had kept the state from the BJPs’ clutches, has also succumbed to pressures from the BJP-driven ED and CBI raids.
It is another reminder that such a polity might keep one in power, but with no teeth. Such alliances only weaken the regional party’s strength, paving the way for the BJP’s national ambitions.
The BJP has managed to snuff out many regional parties, either with ED raids or impotent alliances. Ineffective regional or third parties will help the BJP’s idea of a two-party system that eventually benefits it.
It is ironic that members of the Janata Parivar, which was formed to oppose the authoritarianism of the Emergency era, are now happy bedfellows with the fascist forces in power. From playing a supportive role to fighting for survival, the kingmaker has met its fate.
Swati Krishna is an activist and political observer based in Bengaluru.