By P.T. Bopanna
Sometime during 2020, I was one among the journalists selected for felicitation by chief minister B.S. Yediyurppa as part of the golden jubilee celebrations of the Press Club of Bangalore.
At a function held at the Bangalore Palace Grounds, while chief minister Yediyurappa stood by on the podium, it was his younger son Vijayendra who garlanded and handed over the mementoes to the awardees, including me (in the picture).
There was no doubt that Vijayendra had been playing an active role in the government. But I was not sure whether there was justification in the claim being made by a section of the BJP legislators that Vijayendra had been functioning like a ‘super chief minister’.
The way the allegations were brought about gave the impression that there were forces at work at the highest level in the BJP to dislodge Yediyurappa from the chief minister’s chair.
The Modi-Shah duo had been desperately trying to pack off Lingayat strongman B.S. Yediyurappa to the party’s margadarshak mandal.
But the Raja Huli from Shikaripura had made it known that he would not throw in the towel unless his son B.Y. Vijayendra is anointed as his political successor.
Though the Delhi duo succeeded in the first round by installing Bommai as the chief minister, they were clueless on what to do next.
While prime minister Narendra Modi and home minister Amit Shah succeeded in ousting Yediyurappa, the decimation of the BJP in Karnataka assembly polls had demonstrated that the Lingayat strongman is still a force to reckon in Karnataka politics.
Modi’s jibe at Gandhi family practicing dynastic politics has boomeranged badly. Now Vijayendra has been appointed president of the Karnataka unit of the BJP.
BJP’s dynastic politics is notorious in Kodagu (Coorg) where three controversial brothers have been legislators, including one who is presently a sitting MLC.
Source: Round and About with P T Bopanna, Rolling Stone Publications, 2022. Paperback copies of the book available on Flipkart:
https://www.flipkart.com/round-p-t-bopanna/p/itm058ca8fbc3055
