Narendra Modi fights to retain South India’s prized tech hub in local poll

Voting has started in a local election in Karnataka, the tech hub of southern India, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the opposition Indian National Congress seek control of a state seen as a strategic prize a year before a national vote.

The state, one of Indiathe wealthiest per capita and the center of its information technology industry, is the only one in the country’s most prosperous south held by Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party, whose main power base is in the north.

Congressional candidates have seized on alleged corruption in the state to accuse Karnataka’s BJP government of “looting” money while in power. Fashion retaliated by mocking the powerful Gandhi dynasty that dominates the opposition party by calling it a ‘royal family’. He also trumpeted the value of having a “dual engine” BJP government in the state capital, Bengaluru, and the national capital, New Delhi.

The prime minister, who will seek a third term in 2024, has spent an entire week campaigning around Karnataka in a sign of the importance of Wednesday’s poll in giving momentum to national elections.

Amid strong anti-incumbent sentiment, analysts said the BJP is betting firmly on the popularity of Modi himself, who many Indian voters perceive to be above the political fray.

“The Modi card is the only card they are playing here,” says Chandan Gowda, a social science professor at the Institute for Social and Economic Change in Bangalore. “If the BJP were to lose, it would be a huge setback for them to claim Modi’s huge popularity across the country.”

Modi on Thursday urged the people of Karnataka, especially young people and new voters, to “vote in large numbers and enrich the festival of democracy”. The results of the 224-seat local assembly are due out on Saturday.

Most Indians expect Modi’s BJP to easily win a third term in next year’s elections, which are expected to be held in April and May.

But Congress officials are targeting state polls, including in Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan later this year, as a stepping stone to a political “renewal” to challenge the ruling party on the national stage.

The opposition sent figures such as Rahul Gandhi, their most prominent politician, and his mother Sonia Gandhi to Karnataka, where she campaigned on persistent unemployment and alleged corruption in the state government.

Rahul Gandhi, Modi’s main rival, was recently expelled from national parliament after being convicted of defaming the prime minister in Modi’s home state of Gujarat and sentenced to two years in prison, a verdict he is currently appealing.

Congress released campaign ads last week outlining what it claimed were bribes demanded by the BJP for jobs and government contracts in Karnataka. The BJP filed a complaint with the Election Commission, which ordered Congress to provide proof of the allegations.

At a polling station in a school in the central district of Ulsoor in Bengaluru, Congress supporter and former defense official Raj Stella said he “hoped there would be a change of government”. The BJP-led state government, Stella said, is “playing dirty politics”.

The campaign turned into an exchange of verbal barbs, with Congress speaker Mallikarjun Kharge last week comparing Modi to a “venomous snake”, comments he said were misinterpreted. The Prime Minister responded by saying that the snake in question was a garland around the neck of Shiva, one of the main Hindu deities, and adding that he was happy to be “the snake that adorns the necks of the people”. .

BJP supporters said they expected Modi’s roadshow to boost the ruling party’s chances in Karnataka. “I guess they are the right ones for the future of Karnataka,” said Nandini V, an engineering student. “They will do what they promised.”

Modi and BJP officials have also accused Sonia Gandhi of harboring separatist goals for the state after remarks she made about protecting Karnataka’s “sovereignty”.

Analysts said that whether Congress or the BJP wins the vote, either party may have to turn to the Janata Dal (secular), a regional group that won around a fifth of the vote. vote in Karnataka in the recent elections, as a possible coalition partner.

“Congress will almost certainly be the number one party, and the narrative is in their favor in many parts because the BJP has played a certain way and messed up some things,” said Sugata Srinivasaraju, an author and journalist based in Bengaluru. .

But “Modi’s presence changed things,” he added. “There is Modi brand voting where people may not be loyal to BJP but are loyal to Modi.”