Mangaluru: The battle ground for Mangaluru South Constituency has reached its momentum with voters left with just a little over a day to decide who their winning candidate will be.
The massive campaigns, both the public and social media held by the BJP and the Congress in the run up to the elections will definitely influence the voters selection of their prospective leader. It could be either the approachable incumbent Congress MLA J R Lobo or BJP’s Vedavyas Kamath or perhaps anyone from the independents–Srikar Prabhu and Madan. Not to forget the CPI(M) option available.
The BJP in its campaign had alleged that Lobo claimed credit for the developments in the city, achieved through release of central funds. Also there were allegations about misappropriation of funds allocated for ADB projects. The Congress, on the other hand has alleged that the BJP is playing with sentiments of people and trying to garner votes in name of religion.
Interestingly, the BJP which is associated with the Hindutva approach has fielded Vedavyas Kamath.
Political experts opined that BJP President Amit Shah’s surprise visit to Kudroli Gokarnathashewara Temple, an epic centre of Billawa community during the election campaigning in Mangaluru will help the BJP make inroads into the Billawa votes, who otherwise strongly support veteran Congress leader Janardhan Poojary. It will also help Kamath garner more vote share of BJP ideologues, they felt.
A factor that could hurt BJP’s votebank is that a former leader of the party, Srikar Prabhu who now stands suspended is contesting the elections and if we should go by his campaigns, he will definitely eat a chunk of the votes of the indecisive voters.
Views from Ground Zero:
Speaking to Newskarnataka, Vilasini, a resident of Kadri says that though she feels J R Lobo is a good candidate she does not want to vote for Congress (thanks to the anti-incumbency factor). However, she is not yet decided on if Vedvyas, Sunil Bajal or Srikar would be a better leader.
Another person named Vasudev opined that contrary to Lobo’s claims of contributing in the city’s development, opposition parties alleged that Lobo was responsible for failure and misappropriation in ADB project in the city. This is likely to affect him, he felt.
One more resident, on condition of anonymity, said that Lobo had done good work including construction of musical fountain park, renovating Kadri Park, raising it to a good standard, providing title deed to the poor and homeless, construction of 3D Planetarium in Pilikula. The state government has contributed an equal amount as that of central government for the development of the city.
“I feel people will vote J R Lobo as his emphasis has been on developmental work”, he added.
Meanwhile, few people have expressed that the controversy over renaming Light House Hill road as Sundaram Shetty Road may not work in Lobo’s favour. A section of Bunts community was reportedly hurt that few Congress leaders opposed the move and procured a stay on the possible renaming of the road in honour of Sundaram Shetty, a visionary and founder of the Vijaya Bank.
A lesser-known contestant Madan, an independent candidate and former policeman had also created quite a few ripples with his election campaigning after deciding to choose the cap over the uniform. While people have accepted actors as their leaders in the past, it is to be seen if they will favour the former cop.
Sunil Kumar Bajal contesting from CPI(M) is also a blow to the BJP and Congress party. Sunil Kumar who hails Billawa community is also putting maximum effort to win the constituency.
In conclusion, it seems to be a direct fight between Lobo and Vedavyas for Mangaluru South constituency.
