Mysuru: If BJP national president, Amit Shah is visiting mutts and seers of Lingayats and Veerashaivas to woo both factions ahead of the assembly poll, Chief Minister Siddaramiah is doing his own wooing of the Lingayats in the villages of Chamundeshwari constituency from where he plans to contest the coming poll.
Visiting temples in some villages and offering pooja to the photo of Sri Shivakumara Swami in Daaripura, a large pocket of Lingayats and Vokkaligas, he told the villagers, "It was we who developed Basava Kalyana, came up with a circular to have Basavanna's photo in all the government offices, named women's university at Vijayapura after Akka Mahadevi, and will observe Kempegowda Jayanthi if reelected."
Speaking in much the same vein, but about the Vokkaligas, he told this correspondent in an aside after a meeting with the locals, "The Siddegowdas were all with me when I was in the JD (S), and they are still with me."
When asked by reporters about both the BJP and JD(S) vowing to defeat him in Chamundeswari and his son, in Varuna, he told a press conference, "People vote not based on caste or who the candidate is. They look at the good work I have done and will elect me or my son if he contests in Varuna. No matter what special strategy (JDS leaders) Kumarswamy and Deve Gowda come up with in Chamundeswari, I know its people are with me."
