T Krishnappa Poojary, JD(S) candidate for Bantwal constituency and Haroon Rashid, President of JD(S) Minority Cell, Bantwal Constituency unit, reportedly took their infighting to streets, presenting a sorry picture of their party just hours before the announcement of poll results.
Soundarya Ramesh was initially the party's choice to contest elections from Bantwal. However, owing to BJP's dramatic 'Operation Lotus' tactic, Mr. Ramesh turned his back on the JD(S), putting it in a spot of bother and forcing it to conceal its poll candidate until the very last minute. As things turned out, Mr. Poojary filed his nomination papers on the final day of submitting nomination papers. However, Mr. Poojary reportedly hid behind the scenes and was not available for contact neither to party leaders nor to the public. He made an appearance with just two days to go for the elections and limited his campaign to a couple of 'Padayatras'. He was not even receiving phone calls from party leaders, it is said.
On Sunday, when the polling process was underway, Haroon Rasheed made constant phone calls to Mr. Poojary which were unattended by the latter. Fumed by Mr. Poojary's approach, Mr. Rasheed reportedly sent him an SMS threat. The two then engaged in heated verbal exchanges in public and were about to trade blows, eye-witnesses have said.
Many in the JD(S) camp were not happy with the granting of ticket to Mr. Poojary, who hails from RSS background. Even after being declared Bantwal's JD(S) candidate, he did not hold any press conference or carry out active campaigning, much to the fury of party activists. Mr. Poojary, who had condemned B Nagaraj Shetty for quitting JD(S), is now all set to follow his footsteps, activists say. Chances of Mr. Poojary calling it quits from the JD(S) are said to be very high. With declaration of poll results inching closer, the infighting within the JD(S) has created an air of negativity in the party circles.
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