A day after the president of the BJP OBC Morcha, Puttaswamy, was pushed out of a meeting at Bengaluru’s Palace Grounds by Eshwarappa’s supporters, the Yeddyurappa loyalist was once again ousted by the rebel faction at the BJP’s Mysuru office, on Friday.
The dissent in the party amidst the two factions reached a feverish pitch at Mysuru, when Eshwarappa loyalists gathered outside the party office and refused to let Puttaswamy enter the premises.
Puttaswamy, had on Wednesday, told media persons that Eshwarappa has been going against party norms by holding meetings of the “banned” Sangolli Rayanna Brigade and warned that the rebel leaders and those who go against the party would be suspended.
The two factions have been involved in a blame game ever since Leader of Opposition in the Vidhana Parishad, Eshwarappa, expressed his disillusionment with the party state President B S Yeddyurappa for offering important party portfolios to his sycophants and sidelining veteran politicians.
In order to quash the dissent in the party, which blew over just a year before the Karnataka Assembly polls, Yeddyurappa flew to New Delhi on Friday morning and is slated to meet Amit Shah to discuss the issue of the “rebels”.
Earlier on Friday, Yeddyurappa had alleged that B L Santosh, the BJP’s national office bearer and RSS strongman, was behind the dissent in the party.
In March, the BJP National President held a meeting with Eshwarappa and Yeddyurappa regarding the issue of the Rayanna Brigade. He had also directed Yeddyurappa to hold talks with disillusioned party veterans and iron out the differences.
While Yeddyurappa claims that he has met most of Eshwarappa’s demands, the Leader of Opposition in the Vidhana Parishad maintained that the Lingayat strongman had not included many senior leaders while discussing election strategies for the Nanjangud and Gundlupet bye-polls and accused Yeddyurappa of falling prey to false praises of selfish party members.
The Eshwarappa faction has reportedly urged the national leadership to iron out the internal conflict by May 10. Senior BJP leader Sagodu Shivanna said that he would proceed to hold another rally on May 20, if Yeddyurappa failed to meet their demands by then.
The Eshwarappa faction also demanded, on Thursday, that Yeddyurappa be replaced by Eshwarappa as the party’s state President.
The meeting at Palace Grounds was videotaped, and the speeches made in Kannada were translated to Hindi and Gujarati and sent to Amit Shah.
“The allegation that Santhosh was behind the dissidence against Yeddyurappa is said to have rattled the party leaders. He was the organising secretary for Karnataka and almost mentored the BJP government in Karnataka in 2008. Along the way, he nursed political ambitions,” an unnamed source told the Times of India.