When the humble rise

Now that we have a new government, let's shake hands with some of its heroes.

Bangalore is perhaps India's most anti-poor city, and so there's some poetic justice in Katta Subramanaya Naidu becoming Karnataka's IT and BT minister.

Naidu, once a tea shop assistant, has risen to become a VIP who will now attend cocktail parties hosted by the affluent software crowd and, would you believe it, formulate policies for their advancement. Being a non-IT and non-BT Bangalorean, I take childish pleasure in the thought that some of India's snootiest people will have to walk into Naidu's office respectfully and seek redressal for their problems.

But let's not image even for a moment that Naidu is going to transform the city into a more compassionate place. He made a blinding statement about his prosperity when he married off his daughter last year, and is as interested in the spoils of real estate as his party colleague R Ashok. So Naidugaru, welcome, and may you prosper.

B S Yeddyurappa, who began his career selling limes on a bicycle, now rules the destiny of this state. That is a triumph of democracy and makes us proud. He has single-handedly built the BJP into its present position of somewhat delicate strength.

Yeddyurappa has already declared he will not tolerate corruption, but the talk is that he has handed over some innocuous looking envelopes to his friends in the media. He secretly hopes the media will crown him the best chief minister of India, like they did his Texas-educated predecessor S M Krishna. But he lacks the corporate sophistication of Krishna, and so could end up as a successor to Deve Gowda, whose snoozing pictures made it regularly to the news columns in the English language papers. Watch that space.

Since power came to Yeddyurappa after what seemed like an impossible battle, he may not really want trouble at Bababudangiri, which the Sangh parivar is trying to turn into another Ayodhya. He has abandoned all talk of Hindutva and is chanting the mantra of development, which dovetails neatly into the interests of his best friends in the party, the Reddys of Bellary.

Many feel Yeddyurappa's significant other, or his caste lobby, or the Reddys could eventually be his undoing, but as of now, it's a network that's wired all right.

Last but not the least, the Reddys. Children of police constable Gali Chenga Reddy, they shot to fame and wealth after they invested in a mine in 2004. They export ore to China, and routinely place orders for the most expensive cars and aircraft in the world. With help from Sriramulu, a municipal leader (now minister) who dresses in the flamboyant style of the Telugu movie star Chiranjeevi, they have established complete control over Bellary district.

A report says Janardhana Reddy's business turnover is a staggering Rs 20,000 crore (which adds up to more than the net domestic product of a handful of north-eastern states put together), so it's a wonder he found the time to dabble in politics. He and his brother are in the cabinet today.

Thank you for taking the trouble to get into public service, sirs.

Three swingers and a poll

Last week, as Karnataka’s big parties announced the names of their candidates for next month’s elections, ticket aspirants waited anxiously to see who had made it and who hadn’t.

And as you may already know, those whose names didn’t figure on those lists have started sulking and throwing tantrums. Simultaneously, criminals and policemen are donning khadi and getting into one or the other of the state's three major parties.

All of which is good entertainment, and of course the election season is always a good time for connoisseurs of drama. To add to the excitement, star campaigners are descending from all over India to do their bit for their parties.

Arun Jaitley of the BJP was in Bangalore last week. He made a suave presentation at the Taj West End to a gathering of journalists, who’d received invitations the previous day from velvet-voiced PR girls. (I was unlucky and got a call from a sober male voice).

I was among those who sat at the hotel’s opulent banquet hall and heard the BJP stalwart’s eloquent briefing. He had facts and figures ready, and reeled out numbers without as much as glancing at his notes, but what was most striking was that he spoke no ideology at all. No Hindutva, no talk about fighting corruption or Congress misrule. All he said was that Karnataka should vote for stability.

Jaitley delivered his speech like a CEO at a board meeting, such was the corporate polish of the event. But then, come to think of it, this season could well mark the advent of elections without any ideological fervour. Also, the three big players have slept with one another in the last five years, and cannot really take the pativrata tone without sounding foolish. So if you were the pragmatic type, you would say, “Ah, good, no bullshit!”

But consider the tragedy. The Karnataka assembly has 224 seats, and since the last elections did not deliver a decisive mandate, the Congress, the JD(S) and the BJP were forced to share power — and the spoils. As everyone knows, they got into opportunistic alliances, praising their partners when together, and abusing them when the good times ran out.

In 1977, after Indira Gandhi lifted the Emergency and announced elections, the rest of India sent non-Congress leaders to Delhi as MPs but Karnataka went against the tide. Again in 1978, the state voted a Congress government to power.

But the Congress joy ride jerked to an end. In 1983, Karnataka got its first non-Congress government when the Janata Party took over with Ramakrishna Hegde at the helm. The ideologies of Jayaprakash Narayan, Rammanohar Lohia (and his Kannadiga ideologue Gopala Gowda), the CPM, and the RSS had come together to form an alliance to defeat a satiated and arrogant Congress. The Karnataka voter has thus always remained inscrutable, and unpredictable.

In 1984, after Rajiv Gandhi’s death, an emotional Karnataka sent 24 Congress MPs to Delhi out of 28. Hegde dissolved his government, owning moral responsibility for his party's poor performance, and called for elections right away. Voters stunned the nation by taking a U-turn and sending his Janata Party back to power at the Vidhana Soudha. In the process, the Karnataka electorate won for itself the reputation of being wise and discerning.

One of the heroes of that inspired anti-Congress movement was Deve Gowda, who you saw, these last four years, in the role of the shrewish wife in serial marriages with the Congress and the BJP. Yes, it has been a disgraceful fall, but he is again rubbing his hands in anticipating of a hung assembly, and looking forward to more fun and intrigue.

So friends, Kannadigas and countrymen, this is going to be a battle among three big parties, and it is a battle over the millions they can rake in from real estate and mining. Happy voting, and God save you!