Pralhad Joshi’s clarification of being Brahmin CM face may have political messaging to Lingayats

Union minister Pralhad Joshi’s statement ruling out his returning to the state politics is being seen as the ruling BJP’s political messaging to the dominant Lingayat community to win back its confidence.

Joshi is a Bramin, representing Dharwad in the Lok Sabha. JD(S) leader HD Kumaraswamy had put the BJP in a tight spot, repeatedly saying that the ruling party had planned to make the union minister the next chief minister if it were to win the assembly polls.

Karnataka is headed to assembly election in less than three months, and the BJP leaders are trying to retain power. Karnataka is the only southern state where the BJP is in power, and no ruling party has won the state for a second successive term since 1985.


A recent statement by Joshi criticizing JD-S party’s Pancharatna campaign tour invited disproportionate counter-offensive from Kumaraswamy, turning the public spat into attacks on the Peshwa community.

In his personal attacks on Joshi, the former JD-S chief minister said the BJP was trying to make a member of the Peshwa community as its next CM. He also attacked the Peshwa community as the one whose members killed Mahatma Gandhi and attacked the Sringeri mutt.

Sections of BJP leaders were concerned about potential damage these remarks could cause by sowing seeds of suspicion in the Lingayat community.

Kumaraswamy also sought to isolate Peshwa’s from Karnataka's native Brahmin community, leaving the BJP in a tight spot. As a national party, it could ill-afford to displease both Lingayats and Peshwas.

The BJP has been projecting chief minister Basavaraj Bommai, a Lingayat leader, at its political campaigns. The party carefully chose a Lingayat lawmaker to succeed Yediyurappa when he stepped down in July 2021. The central leaders spoke in lofty terms of Yediyurappa to convey to voters that the party held the tallest political figure from the community in high esteem.

On Saturday, Joshi told the media in Hubballi that the question of his returning to Karnataka politics did not arise at all as he was privileged to be a part of prime minister Narendra Modi’s cabinet.