After speculation for months, former Chief Minister of Karnataka and Congress Leader of the Opposition Siddaramaiah announced that he wants to file his nomination for the upcoming Assembly elections from the Kolar constituency. He made the announcement during his visit to Kolar on Monday, January 9, surrounded by party leaders and workers. “I have decided to file my candidature from Kolar for the next Assembly elections. This is subject to approval by the high command,” Siddaramaiah said. He is currently a legislator from Badami in Bagalkot district.
While it had been fairly certain that Siddaramaiah will not seek to re-contest polls from Badami, the question of where he will instead contest from had been unclear. Siddaramaiah has cited the distance between Badami and Bengaluru making frequent travel challenging as the primary reason for not wanting to go back to the constituency.
The most obvious reason to choose Kolar is the constituency’s proximity to Bengaluru, with travel time less than an hour from the state capital. The constituency is currently held by a JD(S) MLA Srinivas Gowda, who has not formally resigned from his party but has been openly expressing support to the Congress. An understanding has reportedly been struck that Gowda will vacate his seat for Siddaramaiah in the upcoming elections. In addition, veteran Congressman KH Muniyappa, who was a former Kolar MP, has been unhappy with Congress for years now for being sidelined and has been noticeably absent from party activities.
Kolar’s caste break-up also works in favour of Siddaramaiah who has, for long, positioned himself as a leader of the AHINDA community (a Kannada acronym for Alpasankhyataru or minorities, Hindulidavaru or Backward classes, and Dalitaru or Dalits). Although the data is based on informal surveys, the constituency is said to have over 25,000 registered voters from the Kuruba community to which Siddaramaiah belongs. The constituency also has around 21,000 voters from the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe community and over 45,000 Muslim voters in addition to around 9,000 Christian voters. A large chunk of the Vokkaliga and Lingayat voters too could swing in favour of the Congress because of the internal caste politics, say Siddaramaiah’s supporters.
The district also has several strong leaders from Congress, most of whom are supporters of Siddaramaiah. The neighbouring constituencies like Bangarpet, Malur and Srinivasapura have Congress legislators and the party and booth-level workers from there will bolster Siddaramaiah’s campaign in Kolar.
Before settling on Kolar, reports of Siddaramaiah contesting from Chamarajapet in Bengaluru had made rounds. The constituency is held by his close aide Zameer Ahmed Khan who had offered to vacate the seat for Siddaramaiah. After communal tensions erupted over the Eidgah Maidan issue, the seat is reportedly seen as too controversial.
Ending speculations, #Siddaramaiah announces that he intends to contest the upcoming Assembly elections from Kolar. Adds this is subject to approval by the #Congress high command. #KarnatakaElection2023 pic.twitter.com/QtIMNB11bJ
— Pooja Prasanna (@PoojaPrasanna4) January 9, 2023