S Rajashekara/Newindpress
Bangalore, Dec 18: The BSP, which is making serious attempts to widen its base by contesting all the 224 Assembly seats in Karnataka, is likely to upset Congress' apple cart by targeting its traditional vote bank of Dalits and minorities.
The BSP's 'elephant' which marred the Congress' prospects in at least 40 Assembly segments in the 2004 polls is planning to repeat ''its social engineering experiment'' in Uttar Pradesh, by re-working caste combinations in Karnataka.
In the 2004 general elections, the Congress suffered a severe blow as the BSP managed to score 1.8 per cent of the total votes polled by contesting 103 Assembly seats.
''We may not have won a single seat in the previous elections. But our progress has ensured the defeat of Congress candidates in 40 Assembly segments.
In the Lok Sabha polls, we were instrumental in defeating at least five Congress candidates,'' party's general secretary Sridhar Kaliveer told this website's newspaper here on Monday.
Even if the BSP manages to repeat its performance in 2004 elections, the Congress is sure to lose over 80 seats. Efforts to win over the upper-dominant castes and communities in Karnataka are also likely to have a bearing on the outcome of the Assembly poll results in 2008.
To initiate the process and to set the party into election mode, BSP supremo and UP Chief Minister Mayawati is planning to address a mammoth rally ''Brotherhood convention'' at the Palace grounds here on December 23.
Sridhar said that they are working out new caste combinations to repeat the UP results in Karnataka. For example in Hassan, the party is planning a Lingayat-Muslim combination as both these communities had been politically sidelined by Vokkaligas in the district.
The BSP is confident that they can no more be neglected in the State. ''We may not come to power, but we cannot be politically ignored any more. We will make our presence felt,'' Sridhar said.
Worried by the BSP's increasing base, AICC SC/ST cell president Yogendra Makvana recently directed the KPCC SC/ST cell headed by MLC N Manjunath to chalk out a detailed programme to win the traditional voters to the Congress.