No to son, Yeddyurappa says party worker to get Varuna ticket

BENGALURU: BJP’s chief ministerial candidate, BS Yeddyurappa, has said that “an ordinary party worker” will be given the ticket for Varuna, where his son B Y Vijayendra was tipped to face CM Siddaramaiah’s son Yathindra.

BJP sources said this may have been done at the behest of RSS that frowns on dynastic politics, but Congress leaders said Vijayendra had withdrawn as his party and his father had realised they would lose in Varuna, a constituency vacated by Siddaramaiah and dominated by his Kuruba community.
Meanwhile, a third member of the family of mining scam accused G Janardhan Reddy has been named in the fourth list of candidates released by the BJP on Monday.


The party is still to decide on its candidates for Badami , Varuna , Sakleshpur and Sidlaghatta. Chief minister Siddaramaiah is contesting from Badami and his son Yathindra from Varuna. The last date for filing nominations is Tuesday.

Lallan Reddy, said to be a relative of Janardhan’s wife, Lakshmi Aruna, has been given the BJP ticket to take on home minister Ramalinga Reddy in BTM Layout. BJP state spokesperson Vivek Reddy was earlier tipped to get this ticket. Lallan, according to BJP sources, is a realtor, originally from Kurnool, the hometown of Aruna.

Janardhan’s two elder brothers — Karunakar and Somashekar — are BJP’s candidates from Harapanahalli and Bal lari City. “The entire family, with new additions, has now got a grip on the BJP. It is feeling like 2004 again,” a BJP old- t imer told ET.

The fourth l ist also has two new women candidates--H Lilavati in Ramanagaram and Nandini Gowda in Kanakapura. The former will face JDS chief ministerial candidate H D Kumaraswamy while the latter will take on Congress state campaign committee chief D K Shivakumar.