Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (SP)

Bengaluru, Feb 22: JD(S) national president H D Deve Gowda, has been overlooking his age to infuse new life into his party and strengthen its base towards reviving its fortunes in the coming elections. Gowda reportedly is getting good response from grass root level workers and third rung leaders but the second rung leaders of the party have remained aloof, reports say. As these leaders are not even keeping good one-to-one relationships, the party's organizational efforts have suffered.

Deve Gowda has been in the forefront of building the party's fortunes after Operation Lotus coupled with differences with Congress leaders doomed the party's hopes of ruling the state for the full term of five years. After the government collapsed, many legislators are not visiting J P Bhavan, headquarters of the party. Many of the second level leaders have a grouse that when in power, Kumaraswamy and Revanna overlooked them, and did not even sanction enough grants to their constituencies. Because of this grouse, only a few leaders were present at the mega convention and national executive of the party organized in the recent past.

Even though Kumaraswamy spent the entire day in the JD(S) legislature office in the Vidhana Soudha on the day of election to one council seat, only a few leaders met and spoke to him whereas the others spent time in the corridor. Although Revanna invited MLAs and MLCs for lunch on the day of legislature party meeting, only 12 participated. In the meeting of legislature party held in a private hotel recently, 21 out of 34 legislators were present, and out of 16 MLCs, only seven.

A couple of months back, under the leadership of veteran JD(S) leader, Basavaraj Horatti, disgruntled MLCs had directly told Gowda about the reasons for their anger. Gowda who invited some legislators and MLCs agreed that the party was wrong and consoled them. But former minister G T Deve Gowda recently went against the high command and cast his vote for the BJP candidate in the MLC election. Some leaders have openly shown their closeness to BJP leaders, all of which are making it harder for Deve Gowda to build the party back to its original strength.