Janardhana Reddy announces new party to run in 2023 elections in Karnataka

In advance of the upcoming Assembly elections, former Karnataka minister and mining magnate G. Janardhana Reddy on Sunday announced the formation of a new party, ending a 20-year association with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

Janardhana Reddy claimed during a press conference that his support helped the BJP win over 100 seats in the 2008 state elections.

Reddy, who is an accused in the case of illegal mining, then declared the end of his two-decade relationship with the BJP.

Additionally, he declared that he will represent Gangavathi in the Koppal district, outside of Bellari, in the 2023 Assembly elections.

‘Despite BJP leaders saying that I’m not a member of the party and have no relationship with it, the state and its people believed that I’m from that party. That belief has turned out to be false. Today I’m announcing Kalyana Rajya Pragati Paksha, with my own thinking, with the thinking of Basavanna [12th century social reformer], which is against divisive politics in the name of religion and caste,’ Reddy was quoted as saying by PTI.

He told reporters that he will travel around the state in the coming days to organise the party and to interact with the people.

With the exception of a brief period prior to the 2018 Assembly elections, when he campaigned for his close friend and current Minister B Sriramulu in the Molakalmuru Assembly segment, Reddy had been largely politically inactive for nearly 12 years since his alleged involvement in the mining scam led to his arrest by the CBI.

He has been on bail since 2015 after being charged in a multi-crore case of illegal mining.

Karunakara Reddy, the older brother of Reddy, is a BJP lawmaker from the Harapanahalli Assembly district. Somashekar Reddy, the younger brother of Reddy, represents the party’s rural Ballari constituency. Sriramulu is a lawmaker from Molakalmuru in the Chitradurga district and the tribal welfare minister.

As he ended his association with the saffron party, Reddy also mentioned some of the BJP’s leaders, including Atal Bihari Vajpayee, LK Advani, Sushma Swaraj, Ananth Kumar, and BS Yediyurappa.

Reddy first gained political attention when he worked as a campaigner for the late Sushma Swaraj, who ran against Sonia Gandhi from Ballari in the 1999 Lok Sabha elections.