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It's KGF 2024 and here's a look at the key characters in Karnataka

SUMMARY

Karnataka, which gets to elect 28 leaders for the Lok Sabha, the lower house of Indian Parliament, is also home to the country’s tech capital, Bengaluru. The state is famous for its wild swings from one election to another. It's also the only southern state where the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has a strong foothold but the party still can't take the state's voters for granted. For Modi's key national challenger, the Indian National Congress, Karnataka is one state where the party is strong and high on morale after a big swing in its favour in the 2023 state elections. BJP, which got 25 out of 28 seats from Karnataka in 2019 general election, would like a similar sweep this time to achieve its goal of improving the overall tally in the Lok Sabha. It won’t be easy for sure.

Profile imageBy CNBCTV18.com April 23, 2024, 3:17:14 PM IST (Published)
4 Min Read
The 2024 Lok Sabha election marks the return to prominence for BS Yediyurappa, former chief minister of the state. However, his name is not on the ballot. Yediyurappa had been sidelined by the national leadership in the days since his party, the BJP, swept the last general election. The 2023 state assembly election was fought under the leadership of BL Santosh, the BJP's national general secretary. However, Yediyurappa, the most prominent leader of the state’s Lingayat community, has seen a resurgence since the party’s embarrassing loss in the state polls. His goal will be to improve the BJP’s vote share from 36.3% in 2023 and, possibly, better than the 51% the party scored in 2019. His son BY Raghavendra will be fighting for the BJP in the Shimoga constituency.
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The 2024 Lok Sabha election marks the return to prominence for BS Yediyurappa, former chief minister of the state. However, his name is not on the ballot. Yediyurappa had been sidelined by the national leadership since his party, the BJP, swept the last general election. The 2023 state assembly election was fought under the leadership of BL Santosh, the BJP's national general secretary. However, Yediyurappa, the most prominent leader of the state’s Lingayat community, has seen a resurgence since the party’s embarrassing loss in the state polls. His goal will be to improve the BJP’s vote share from 36.3% in 2023 and, possibly, better than the 51% the party scored in 2019. His son BY Raghavendra will be fighting for the BJP in the Shimoga constituency.

Fighting from the family stronghold in Mandya, it's a do-or-die election for HD Kumaraswamy, his party, the Janata Dal (Secular), and the Gowda family that controls the party. Former Prime Minister of India, and JDS leader, HD Deve Gowda, has seen the party’s fortunes decline from a vote share of 23% in 2018 assembly election to 9.7% in 2019 Lok Sabha Election and 13.4% in the 2023 state polls. The party that was once a significant regional player has been weakened to a point where it has had to get into an alliance with rival BJP for the 2024 Parliamentary election. The BJP got into the alliance to leave no stone unturned in its efforts to get nearly every Lok Sabha seat in Karnataka. The JDS got three seats, one for each Gowda family member fighting this election. The Vokkaliga community, which once propped up the Gowda family to their political peak, now has another choice: DK Shivakumar from the Congress.
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Fighting from the family stronghold in Mandya, it's a do-or-die election for HD Kumaraswamy, his party, the Janata Dal (Secular), and the Gowda family that controls the party. Former Prime Minister of India, and JDS leader, HD Deve Gowda, has seen the party’s fortunes decline from a vote share of 23% in 2018 assembly election to 9.7% in 2019 Lok Sabha Election and 13.4% in the 2023 state polls. The party that was once a significant regional player has been weakened to a point where it has had to get into an alliance with rival BJP for the 2024 Parliamentary election.

Shivakumar, the Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka, is one of the many power centres in the Indian National Congress. He is also one of the rare success stories in the last decade when his party has been relegated to a political margin that it wants to break out of. Shivakumar may have chosen to play second fiddle to state Chief Minister K Siddaramaiah in 2023. However, as the state president of the Congress, if Shivakumar delivers a second consecutive election for the party, he will have a much bigger muscle to flex. The Congress has never won more than nine seats in Karnataka since 1998 and has not won a single seat in the state capital, Bengaluru, since 2004. DK Shivakumar has an opportunity to upend the trend and the rewards may be huge!
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Shivakumar, the Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka, is one of the many power centres in the Indian National Congress. He is also one of the rare success stories in the last decade when his party has been relegated to a political margin that it wants to break out of. Shivakumar may have chosen to play second fiddle to state Chief Minister K Siddaramaiah in 2023. However, as the state president of the Congress, if Shivakumar delivers a second consecutive win for the party, he will have a much bigger muscle to flex. The Congress has never won more than nine seats in Karnataka since 1998 and has not won a single seat in the state capital, Bengaluru, since 2004. DK Shivakumar has an opportunity to upend the trend and the rewards may be huge!

Shivakumar's younger sibling DK Suresh is one of the Congress candidates. In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, when the Narendra Modi wave swept the nation, Suresh was the only Congress candidate from Karnataka to bag a seat in the Parliament. He won the 2013 Lok Sabha by-poll and defeated senior BJP leader Ashwath Narayan by a margin of over 2 lakh votes in 2014. This time, DK Suresh is the Congress candidate from Bengaluru rural where he’s facing a strong candidate whose personal accomplishments complement his political pedigree. A BJP candidate who would like to swing the Vokkaliga community vote away from Congress. Suresh's opponent once got a letter of appreciation from none other than Barack Obama when he was the US President.
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Shivakumar's younger sibling DK Suresh is one of the Congress candidates. In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, when the Narendra Modi wave swept the nation, Suresh was the only Congress candidate from Karnataka to bag a seat in the Parliament. He won the 2013 Lok Sabha by-poll and defeated senior BJP leader Ashwath Narayan by a margin of over 2 lakh votes in 2014. This time, DK Suresh is the Congress candidate from Bengaluru rural where he’s facing a strong candidate whose personal accomplishments complement his political pedigree. A BJP candidate who would like to swing the Vokkaliga community vote away from Congress. Suresh's opponent once got a letter of appreciation from none other than Barack Obama when he was the US President.

Obama's letter of appreciation was for the hospital that CN Manjunath led for 25 years until January this year. In 2013, Manjunath reportedly used Obamas letter to change the city's metro rail plan from intruding into his hospital's space. The 66-year-old Manjunath has been famous even before he entered politics as the BJP candidate in Bengaluru Rural, which includes the Electronics City, one of the country's top technology hubs. He won the Padma Shri, the fourth-highest civilian award in India, in 2015 for his contribution to medicine as a cardiologist at a government hospital in Karnataka. He's also married to JDS chief HD Deve Gowda's daughter. And he's facing off Congress' DK Suresh, a three-time member of Parliament.
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Obama's letter of appreciation was for the hospital that CN Manjunath led for 25 years until January this year. In 2013, Manjunath reportedly used Obamas letter to change the city's metro rail plan from intruding into his hospital's space. The 66-year-old Manjunath was famous even before he entered politics as the BJP candidate in Bengaluru Rural, which includes the Electronics City, one of the country's top technology hubs. He won the Padma Shri, the fourth-highest civilian award in India, in 2015 for his contribution to medicine as a cardiologist at a government hospital in Karnataka. He's also married to JDS chief HD Deve Gowda's daughter. And he's facing off Congress' DK Suresh, a three-time member of Parliament.

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