Stiff fight between BJP, Congress in Varuna

Mysuru: The Varuna constituency has drawn the attention of people of state and the country as it is high voltage constituency since former chief minister Siddaramaiah is contesting from here. The constituency is native of Siddaramaiah as he was born in a location which comes under this constituency.

During 2018 election Siddaramaiah contested from Chamundeshwari a neighbouring constituency and Badami constituency in north Karnataka. The Varuna was represented by Siddaramaiah's son Dr Yatindra Since three months it was said that Siddu would contest from Kolar constituency to polarise OBC votes.

Even Congress high command showed green signal for Siddu to contest from Kolar. But the internal survey revealed that amid two faction politics in Kolar district , one by former speaker Ramesh Kumar and another one former railway minister K H Muniyappa, Siddaramaiah may lose .

Then Siddaramaiah decided to contest from Varuna thinking it's a safe place and he can spend more time in campaigning in other parts of the state . But the BJP high command which is striving to defeat Siddaramaiah in his home constituency fielded Chamarajanagara district in charge minister V Somanna from Varuna. The BJP strategy is that Varuna has sizeable Lingayat votes if Somanna manages to get Lingayat votes as he is also belongs to that community , he may win.

And defeat of Siddaramaiah would be set back for Congress. Somanna a native of Bengaluru is contesting from Chamarajanagara along with Varuna. In 2018 former chief minister B S Yediyurappa's son B Y Vijayendra plans to contest from Varuna. But finally the party high command did not agree for Vijayendra's contest.

But this time BJP high command gave green signal for Vijayendra to contest in Varuna but Yediyurappa decided not to contest from Varuna as the contest may darken political future of Vijayendra. According to sources Varuna is stronghold of congress Iand it is difficult to win against Siddaramaiah's family Then Vijayendra chose Shikaripura in Shivamogga and is contesting from there.

The Varuna constituency was formed in 2008 after reclassification of constituencies. In 2008 election Siddaramaiah defeated BJP candidate Revana Siddaiah by over marginof 18,484 votes. In 2013 election Siddaramaiah defeated BJP candidate Kapu Siddalinga swamy by over margin of 30,000 votes. In 2018 election Dr Yatindra Siddaramaiah defeated BJP candidate Basavaraju by over margin of 59,000 votes. It has proved stronghold of Congress. Now V Somanna is doing brisk campaigning along with MP Pratap Simha . The contest of Somanna , a strong Lingayat leader is giving sleepless nights to Siddaramaiah also as he spending more time in Varuna campaigning. Both the parties making strategy and counter strategy to win in Varuna. But it is really hard to snatch Varuna from clutches of Congress.

The constituency has nearly 2.33 lakh voters with an impressive number of Lingayat and Kuruba voters in the area which seems to be favorable for Siddaramaiah. Gaining a strong number of loyal followers over the years with his son Yathindra gaining praise for his development work, the turf remains strong for Congress. The approximate caste equation in the area includes Lingayat-55000, Kuruba-35000, Vokkaliga-12000, and OBC-12000.

Whereas, Muslim voters at the Varuna assembly stand to be around 10,293, which is around 4.6 per cent as per voter list analysis. There are a total of 2,33,812 voters in the constituency including general voters, NRI voters, and service voters. Amongst the general voters, around 1,08,249 are male and 1,05,547 are female, whereas 13 are others. The electorate sex ratio in Varuna stands at 97.5 and the literacy rate is 61

percent.