NINE MONTHS after expressing deep disappointment over how he had been treated in the BJP, influential Lingayat leader and former Karnataka Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar left the Congress to return to the BJP on Thursday.

He was accompanied by BJP’s Lingayat strongman and former CM B S Yediyurappa, and state BJP chief B Y Vijayendra for a meeting with Union Home Minister Amit Shah to script the return.

“The national leaders (of the BJP) also said I should return, and this morning I spoke to Amit Shah,  who welcomed me affectionately. I am now an MLC of the Congress and I have resigned via email. I have spoken to (Legislative Council Chairman Basvaraj) Horatti on the phone and also communicated my decision to D K Shivakumar. I am joining the BJP,” Shettar said.

Shettar, 68, a BJP veteran with a long family lineage in the party, said he was returning to “strengthen the hand of Prime Minister Narendra Modi” in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls. “The party gave me a lot of responsibilities in the past. Due to some issues, I went to the Congress. In the last nine months, there were a lot of discussions. Also, BJP workers asked me to come back to the party. Yediyurappaji and (Karnataka BJP president B Y) Vijayendraji also wanted me to come back to the BJP. I am rejoining the party with the belief that Narendra Modi ji has to become the prime minister again,” he said after joining the BJP.

The move is seen as another feather in the cap of Yediyurappa, who is once again in full charge of the party state unit. The move is likely to strengthen Yediyurappa’s standing as a leader of Lingayats and counter efforts by Shettar’s rivals in the Hubbali region, like Union minister Pralhad Joshi, to achieve ascendancy in the region.

“It was the desire of all party workers that he must return to the party. This (move) will strengthen the party and give it a big boost for the Lok Sabha elections to win 25 to 26 seats,” Yediyurappa said.

Vijayendra too echoed his father’s views and termed the move a homecoming for Shettar.

Union minister Bhupendra Yadav said Shettar wanted to rejoin due to his past association with the party and the relentless efforts of Modi towards bringing “Ram Rajya” in the country.

A six-time MLA from Hubli Dharwad region, the support of Shettar will prove critical for the BJP in retaining the Dharwad Lok Sabha seat, with sitting BJP MP Pralhad Joshi, who is a Brahmin, relying heavily on his clout for winning the seat.

Shettar, a soft-spoken politician who enjoys good relations with leaders across the political spectrum, had quit the BJP in April last year after Mahesh Tenginakai was preferred by the party over him for the Hubbali-Dharwad seat. At the time, he had said: “I have worked for the party for more than 30 years and have built it. They could have intimated to me two or three months ago, and I would have accepted it… I will not blame the senior leaders of the party like PM Narendra Modi. I will not blame Amit Shah. I will not criticize Nadda Ji. I feel that the real developments in Karnataka have not been brought to the notice of central leaders.”

His exit from the BJP was seen as a fallout of the tussle between Yediyurappa and the party’s national secretary, B L Santhosh.

The former CM had also alleged that the ticket distribution process was under the control of a handful of people in the BJP and that there was an organised effort to sideline him as he was a possible CM face.

However, Shettar had failed to win from his bastion of Hubbali Dharwad on a Congress ticket in the Assembly elections that followed.

Shettar’s switch expectedly prompted fierce reactions from Congress leaders. Karnataka Congress chief and Deputy CM D K Shivakumar said the party had treated him respectfully even though he lost the polls by over 35,000 votes and that the trust that the party had shown in him had been broken. “I spoke to him yesterday morning and he assured me that he will not leave the party as Congress had given him another life in politics,” he said, adding that he had learnt about Shettar rejoining the BJP from the media and they were yet to receive his resignation.

On Shettar’s comments that he was rejoining the BJP in the interest of the country, the Deputy CM asked whether he had not considered the interests of the country while joining the Congress in April.

Shivakumar also ruled out the possibility of other former BJP leaders like Laxman Savadi, who had joined the Congress ahead of the polls, following suit.

CM Siddaramaiah said Shettar had joined the Congress alleging insult by the BJP, and the Congress had fielded him since he was a senior leader. “He has not faced any injustice or insult in the Congress,” he said.

Shettar’s departure had been a big loss for the BJP given his stature in the Lingayat community and his long stint in the party. He had led the party as CM at a turbulent time in 2012 when Yediyurappa had left to float his own outfit – the Karnataka Janata Paksha.

Shettar’s uncle Sadashiv Shettar was the first member of the BJP — albeit in its Jana Sangh avatar — to be elected to the Karnataka Assembly in 1967 (from the Hubli constituency). His father S S Shettar was a five-time councillor in the Hubli-Dharwad City Corporation and served as the first Jana Sangh mayor of any city in southern India.

The Hubli region of Mumbai Karnataka, with nearly 20% of its population Lingayat, has hence been seen widely as a fiefdom of the Shettars.

Shettar’s exit will be a blow to the Congress bid to consolidate the Lingayat vote bank ahead of the Lok Sabha polls. With Yediyurappa calling the shots and son Vijayendra as state chief, the Lingayats are set to rally behind the BJP again.

Meanwhile, the Vokkaliga end is already stitched for the BJP courtesy its tie-up with the JD(S).