Battle of contrasts: It's Yogeshwar vs Nikhil in Channapatna bypoll

NT Ramanagar/Bengaluru: There are few electoral battles in recent years which are so contrasting as the prestigious one for the Channapatna Assembly seat in Ramanagara district. One of the candidates in contention has never won an election since entering the fray a few years ago in Mandya while the other is a veteran of many political fights and also has the distinction of having been in as many as three parties in his chequered career besides fighting as an Independent! Newly-inducted Congressman CP Yogeshwar filed his nomination for the Channapatna by-election on Thursday on a day the rival JD(S) named party Karnataka youth wing president Nikhil Kumaraswamy as the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) nominee.

The candidacy was finalized at BJP heavyweight BS Yediyurappa’s Bengaluru residence after a last-minute discussion between the allies. Yogeshwar resigned as MLC on Monday, quit the BJP and joined the Congress on Wednesday in a day of flip - flops with the BJP giving in to the JD(S) on the seat. Pollsters believe workers in Yogeshwar’s camp who make up the bulk of the BJP’s cadre in Channapatna combined with the strength of Congress would secure him a victory. Yogeshwar also expressed optimism. “People of the taluk love me more than the symbol I contest on. They have been blessing me,” Yogeshwar said. “An injustice was done to me. I didn’t get the opportunity I should have gotten. The people will support me because I was victimized by a conspiracy,” he added.

Yogeshwar had lost Channapatna to JD(S) bigwig HD Kumaraswamy in 2018 and then again in 2023. However, Kumaraswamy won the Mandya Lok Sabha seat, landed a Union Ministry in June and vacated Channapatna. Yogeshwar hoped to regain the seat with JD(S) help but Kumaraswamy insisted on giving the ticket to his son Nikhil instead. Nikhil on the other hand was not keen on contesting from Channapatna and wanted to focus on the organisation while preferring a local worker as the nominee.

“You (mediapersons) have discussed how the last two elections were like a ‘chakravyuh’ (trap from the epic Mahabharata). Another ‘chakravyuh’ has been created. However, leaders and workers from both parties will give me the strength to break this ‘chakravyuh,” Nikhil said. He was referring to his loss to Sumalatha Ambareesh in the Mandya Lok Sabha seat in 2019 and the Ramanagara seat to NA Iqbal Hussain.

5 time MLA to contest again Yogeshwar a five-time Channapatna MLA  was first elected to the Assembly in 1999 as an independent, then as a Congressman in 2004 and 2008. He represented the segment in 2011, this time on a BJP ticket.