BJP President Amit Shah on Friday said Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and his Congress as well as the Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) were in for a "shock" in the May 12 assembly elections from the Mysuru region."Though our party may be a bit weak in the region, I expect Siddaramaiah and the JD-S to get biggest shock of their life in the assembly poll result," said Shah at a party rally here.The BJP chief, who is on a two-day visit to the region, claimed that only the BJP had the ability to overthrow the Congress government from the state and not the JD-S, which could win a few seats here and there.Admitting that the BJP drew a blank in the previous assembly poll from the region, which has 26 seats across four districts, Shah said he was confident of his party giving a tough fight to the Congress and JD-S to win as many seats, owing to the hard work of the cadres and leaders."Congress President Rahul Gandhi and Siddaramaiah made fun of me for mistakenly taking (BJP Chief Ministerial candidate B.S.) Yeddyurappa's name to assert that the latter's government was the most corrupt in the country. I made a mistake but the people of Karnataka won't. They will throw the Congress out," he said.
The erstwhile princely state region is also the home turf of Siddaramaiah, who plans to contest from Chamundeshwari and field his son Yetindra from Varuna in this district.Known as the heartland of Vokkaligas, the second politically dominant community after the Lingayats in the state, the region has been a tough battlefield for the BJP in the state assembly and parliament elections.Asserting that the Congress cannot put the state on the growth path as it was steeped in corruption and miss-governance nor the JD-S whose presence is limited in the state, Shah urged the people to vote for the BJP to develop the state on a fast track.Shah also accused Siddaramaiah of playing with Karnataka's pride by not celebrating the "Jayanti" of noted Kannada poet Kuvempu or renowned engineer Sir M Vishveswaraiah."Siddaramaiah only remembers to celebrate the Jayanti of Tipu Sultan, the 18th-century ruler of Mysore, to get votes," he said.Union Minister Ananth Kumar, Yeddyurappa, Mysuru Lok Sabha member Pratap Simha and party's legislator C.T Ravi and other local leaders were present at the rally.