What we know about the defections in Karnataka and does this signal the political wind?

With the temperatures soaring ahead of the Karnataka Assembly elections, reports of large scale defections from political parties have been reported.

The last time one heard of such massive defections was during the West Bengal assembly elections. While it did not work for the BJP and the Trinamool Congress emerged victorious, the question is what impact would such defections have in Karnataka.

In the recent weeks, one has read a lot about the defections taking place in the BJP and Janata Dal (S) with leaders moving to the Congress.

Does this signal what the political wind in the state is? OneIndia caught up with leading psephologist Dr. Sandeep Shastri to discuss this issue.

Dr. Shastri says that there are multiple contestants or claimants to a ticket. The moment someone comes into your party, he or she becomes a claimant to a ticket from the seat they have contested.

Leaders tend to leave A party to join B party in the ancipatoon that they may not get tickets. They believe that they have a greater chance of getting a ticket in another party. This kind of floor crossing happens, when they feel they are not in the good books of the head of the party. If there is a leader who feels that the state or central leadership is against them, they they use this an opportunity to jump ship, Dr. Shastri says.

He also cited the example of Congress backed candidate Tejaswini who defeated former Prime Minister, H D Deve Gowda.

"Tejaswini, who was backed by the Congress defeated Deve Gowda of the JD(S). She however fell out with the state leadership of the Congress and joined the BJP. Now she is an MLC with the BJP. She felt the need to move on as the state leadership did not back her, " says Dr. Shastri.

He explains that there is a threat of defecting and actually defecting. There would be many leaders who hold out the threat of leaving. This usually happens before an election as they are worried about being given tickets. These are just pressure tactics, he said. This is something that we witness before the election. It also happens post the elections and this is a complicated process as they look to circumvent the anti-defection law as was seen in the case of Maharashtra, Dr. Shastri adds.

On the key question weather defections into a party signal in which direction the political wind is blowing, Dr. Shastri says that this may not be the case necessarily.

"It need not necessarily be the sign of strength of a party. It also does not indicate the way the political wind is blowing. This trend indicates an individual's disgruntlement within a party. It is also a sign that all is not well within that party," he added.