Even though his name, according to the affidavit submitted to the Election Commission, is M. Lakshman, Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee president and Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar made it a point to call their party candidate in the Mysuru Lok Sabha constituency “Lakshman Gowda”.
He reasoned that he was postfixing “Gowda” to emphasise the fact that the party had chosen Vokkaliga candidates in eight Lok Sabha constituencies. Mr. Lakshman is pitted against the scion of the erstwhile royal family of Mysuru Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar, who is the BJP candidate.
Though the Congress appears to be looking to use caste as an electoral tool, the party does not wish to be seen as “casteist”. Hence, Mr. Lakshman has been saying that he was born a “Vokkaliga”, but aspired, as he grew up, to become a “Vishwa Manava” or “person with universal consciousness” on the ideals of poet laureate Kuvempu.
