Ramanagara: Anithakka Yellidhiri?

Bengaluru: If there is one political family which has been at the receiving end of biting sarcasm for its all too frequent ‘disappearing acts,’ it is the family of former PM Deve Gowda and Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy.

After Chief Minister Kumaraswamy's son, Nikhil, was trolled heavily on social media with the sarcastic comment, 'Nikhil Yellidiyappa?' (Where are you Nikhil?) during the recent Mandya Lok Sabha polls, it's his mother and Ramanagara MLA, Anitha Kumaraswamy's turn to be trolled similarly for her absence from her constituency.

The phrase ‘Nikhil Yellidiyappa’ was used by his rivals to show that Nikhil was nowhere in the race for the Mandya parliamentary constituency, where he faced a formidable opponent in Independent candidate Sumalatha Ambareesh.

His problems were compounded by the fact that several former MLAs of the coalition partner, Congress, skipped his campaign.  

The ‘Anithakka Yellidhiri?’ (Anitha where are you?)  campaign on the other hand, is the handiwork of two office-bearers of the Ramanagar district BJP unit to whip up local sentiment against the Congress-JD(S) coalition government and to target the dynastic politics of the Deve Gowda family.  

The duo deplored that when the district is facing a severe water shortage, the MLA has not bothered to visit it for the last month or hold a review meeting of the various departments since the onset of summer.   

Ms Anitha Kumaraswamy has stayed away from her constituency for over a month,  visiting temples and performing special pujas and havans for the victory of her son, Nikhil from Mandya. And once the elections were over in Karnataka, she accompanied her husband and son to a resort for some rest.   

But her long absence from Ramanagar constituency has not gone unnoticed. The last time she  visited it was during the Lok Sabha election campaign of D.K. Suresh, the sitting Bengaluru Rural MP, and brother of Water Resources Minister, D.K. Shivakumar, now a close friend of the Kumaraswamy family.

Seeing her prolonged absence as a sign of her disinterest in their welfare, people have joined in trolling her on social media, repeatedly asking "Anithakka Yellidhiri?" 

Nikhil Yellidiyappa? at a temple too!

KALABURAGI: If Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy had assumed that the  “Nikhil Yellidiyappa?” taunt which went viral on social media during the Mandya Lok Sabha polls, would die a quiet death now that the polls were over, he was sorely mistaken.  

The jolt came when the CM visited the Dattatreya Ganagapura temple in Afzalpur on Tuesday. After the archaks had performed the customary 'aarati,' the CM began to felicitate them. Chief Archak Dattatreya looked around and asked, "Nikhil Yellidiyappa?"

The CM was taken aback and responded with a wary smile. Then came the surprise-the archak told him that 'Nikhil' was the name of his son too and he was only calling for his son as he did not see him in the crowd! The archak recounted how his son too was the target of the 'Nikhil yellidiyappa' taunt by fellow archaks during the Mandya poll.