BS Yeddyurappa
Manisha Singh
A popular leader of the Lingayat community, Bookanakere Siddalingappa Yeddyurappa is the man who is credited to have led the Bhartiya Janata Party to its first government in the South. He became the chief minister of Karnataka when BJP won a historic victory in the 2008 Assembly elections. However, not even in his wildest dreams BSY, as he is called, would have thought that a day would come when he would have to leave his own party. And the BJP too would not have imagined that five years down the line, the party would be on the verge of losing its first bastion in South India.
Born on 27 February 1943, Yeddyurappa was associated with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh from his college days, but his spell in public life began when he was appointed as secretary of the Sangh`s Shikaripur unit in 1970. He was appointed president of the Shikaripura taluk unit of the BJP in 1980 and in 1988 he became the state president of the BJP in Karnataka. In 1983 he was elected as a MLA for the first time and has since then represented the Shikaripura constituency six times.
However, BSY tasted real power for the first time when he helped Janata Dal (Secular) leader HD Kumaraswamy to bring down the coalition government headed by Dharam Singh and form an alternative government with BJP. At that time an agreement was made between the JD(S) and BJP, which said that Kumaraswamy would be CM for the first 20 months and then Yeddyurappa would become the chief minister for the next 20 months.
But when it was BSY’s turn to become the CM in October 2007, Kumaraswamy refused to leave his post, forcing Yeddyurappa and his party ministers to resign. Thus on October 05, the BJP withdrew support to the Kumaraswamy government and subsequently Karnataka came under President`s rule which was revoked on November 07 after JD(S) and the BJP buried their differences and Yeddyurappa become the 25th CM of Karnataka on 12 November 2007. But it was short-lived as JD(S) refused to support his government after a disagreement erupted on the sharing of ministries.
Subsequently, state elections were held in 2008 wherein Yeddyurappa led the BJP to victory in Karnataka and the party probably thought that this would open the floodgates to other southern states. However, much water has passed under the bridge since then and the man finally left the BJP and formed his own party, the Karnataka Janata Party or KJP.
In November 2010, the Karnataka Lokayukta investigating illegal mining indicted Yeddyurappa for illegally profiteering from land deals in Bangalore and Shimoga, and also in connection with the illegal iron ore export scam in Bellary, Tumkur and Chitradurga districts. Following pressure from the BJP central leadership, he resigned on 31 July 2011 as the CM.
He was arrested on October 15, 2011; hours after the lokayukta court issued an arrest warrant in two cases of corruption against him. Later, he was granted bail after spending 23 days in jail. After much bitterness with BJP leaders in Delhi and feeling slighted at not being reinstated as CM, he resigned from the primary membership of BJP and formed his own party – the Karnataka Janata Party. In the Karnataka local polls in March this year, which had been billed as the semi finals before the state Assembly elections, the KJP was routed and failed to make an impact.