The tumultuous relationship between Congress and JDS

BENGALURU: A day before the election results for Karnataka came out, a JD(S) partyworker made a categorical statement. “Today is the last day Siddaramaiah will be the chief minister. Day after tomorrow, our Kumaranna will take oath and Siddaramaiah will be out.”

The statement typifies the fraught relationship that the Congress party has with the Janata Dal (S), particularly because Siddaramaiah is a serious bone of contention between the two. Both Siddaramaiah and JD(S) chief ministerial candidate Kumaraswamy (better known as Kumaranna) appeared visibly uncomfortable with each other as they went to meet Governor Vajubhai Vala together on Tuesday evening to form a government in the state, after an intense campaign abusing each other. .

The discomfort is rooted in history and the fierce anger that JD(S) national president H D Deve Gowda has against the Congress party for “taking Siddaramaiah from me.” The Congress and the JD(S) are rancorous rivals in old Mysuru region and Siddaramaiah was Gowda’s staunch disciple and supporter who built the party with him from the late 1980s to 2004.


The Congress and the JD(S) parties came together in 2004, when Karnataka threw up a mixed mandate, with BJP getting 79 seats, the Congress 65 and the JD(S) 58. Siddaramaiah was made deputy chief minister to N Dharam Singh of the Congress.

Singh went to town praising Siddaramaiah, while the party national leadership also warmed up to him. Siddaramaiah, bitter that Gowda, had not ensured the CM’s post for him, was further angered when Kumaraswamy began interfering in government and political decisions, over-riding him.

“Kumaraswamy decided who the cabinet members from our party were, though I was the leader of the legislative party,” Siddaramaiah had said to his inner circle, then. Siddaramaiah began working on building his own support base, angering Gowda who expelled him, even as Kumaraswamy worked out a deal with the BJP and formed a coalition government with them.

Siddaramaiah abstained from the trust vote for Kumaraswamy’s DS-BJP coalition, resigned from his seat and contested as a Congress candidate from Chamundeshwari in a high-voltage bypoll that he won by a mere 257 votes. It led to such bitterness that he and Gowda did not speak to each other for nearly 10 years.