Voters in Karnataka handed a decisive mandate to help stabilise the four-month old Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government, led by B.S.Yediyurappa, over contentions of political morality as it registered victory in 12 out of the total 15 constituencies in the bypolls.

The mandate in which 11 out of the 13 disqualified legislators won inspite of their role in bringing down the H.D. Kumaraswamy-led coalition government allegedly for personal gain, indicating that engineering defections is indeed a sustainable political strategy that could pave the way for similar actions in other states.

Monday’s results will take BJP’s tally to 116 (excluding the Speaker) in the 224-seater house and giving the party much needed relief after it lost Maharashtra last month. The party also enjoys the support of independent legislator taking its tally to 117 with two seats remaining vacant.

“In the remaining three and a half years, I along with my cabinet and legislators will give good governance and aim to win 150 seats in the next elections," an ecstatic Yediyurappa said in Bengaluru.

True to his word, Yediyurappa said that those legislators who resigned from the coalition and stood by the BJP will be given ministerial berths. The BJP had left 16 berths vacant of the total 34 to placate the rebels.

Party leaders and analysts says that voters had to either back Yediyurappa by overlooking the BJP’s role in bringing down Kumaraswamy govt or vote against them and plunge further into a political crisis since the Congress and JD(S) had snapped ties, leaving no alternative to take over the reins of the government. Yediyurappa’s plea to the dominant Lingayat community for support paid off and kept him in power after he was forced to step down from the top office three times in the past.

BJP won in Athani, Kagwad, Gokak, Vijayanagara, Yellapur, Yeshvanthapura, K.R.Pura, Mahalakshmi Layout, Rannebennur, Hirekerur, Chikkaballapur and Krishnarajapete (K.R.Pete).

“I was expecting that the voters of these constituencies will teach them a lesson for having defected to the BJP," Siddaramaiah, the Congress’ leader of the opposition said. He and Dinesh Gundu Rao said that they take moral responsibility for the loss and have handed in their resignations to Sonia Gandhi. “I think we should be writing the epitaph of democracy & constitution in Karnataka. People who took their mandate for granted, left for the lust of money & power have been re-elected in #KarnatakaByelection. Not a good sign for democracy," Priyank Kharge of the Congress posted on Twitter.

The win in K.R. Pete in the sugarcane growing district of Mandya was probably its sweetest as it is the first time the BJP has won any elected representation from this Vokkaliga dominated region, indicating the waning influence of former prime minister H.D.Deve Gowda and Kumaraswamy, who put their might to defeat Narayan Gowda of the BJP.

Narayan Gowda, who defected from the JD(S) to the BJP, had alleged that he was tormented by Gowda’s daughters, preventing him to do any constituency-related work.

The victory in K.R. Pete also legitimises the imminent entry of B.Y. Vijayendra, the second son of Yediyurappa who was in charge of this constituency, into BJP's fold after the historic win.

“The platform of political morality that the Congress and JD(S) stood on did not gain any traction," A. Narayana, political analyst and faculty at the Azim Premji University said.

A.H. Vishwanath, N. Nagaraju and M. Saravana of the BJP lost in Hunasuru, Hosakote and Shivajinagar respectively. Nagaraju lost to independent candidate Sharath Kumar Bache Gowda, who decided to contest on his own after the party denied him a ticket in favour of Nagaraju.

But problems for the BJP haven’t completely blown over if its past is anything to go by. Though the BJP managed to get a majority in 2008 after engineering defections, it led to clashes between the old guard and new entrants, thus leading to factionalism, resort politics and an eventual collapse, which took it over a decade to recover from. It remains to be seen if 2019 bypoll victories will be any different.

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