The BJP is counting on the ‘social engineering’ it has taken up in Karnataka by tweaking the reservation arithmetic, as the ruling party heads into assembly polls with Prime Minister Narendra Modi leading the charge and former chief minister BS Yediyurappa playing a big part.

With the election date for Karnataka assembly polls announced on Wednesday, the BJP has started the process to finalise its candidates for the 224 seats and is likely to announce the list by April 8, party sources said. It will contest the election without a chief ministerial face, they told ET.

The Basavaraj Bommai government’s decision to increase the reservation quota for STs from 3% to 7% and for SC’s from 15% to 17%, as well as scrapping the OBC quota for Muslims and distributing that to the Lingayats and Vokkaligas, will help the BJP in countering the ‘Ahinda’ vote bank of the Congress, feel BJP leaders. ‘Ahinda’ is a Kannada acronym for minorities, Dalits and backward classes.

The state government has also announced internal quotas for SCs: 6% for SC (Left), a segment which BJP sees as its supporters; 5.5% for SC (Right); 4.5% for touchables (Banjara, Bhovi, Korcha, Kuruma, etc.) and 1% for others.

In its last cabinet meeting, the Bommai government scrapped the 4% reservation for Muslims under the OBC category and distributed it equally among the politically dominant Lingayats and Vokkaligas.

“We have done social justice with these modifications in reservation structure so that reservation benefit reaches all castes on the basis of their numeric strength,” union minister Bhagawanth Khuba, a Lingayat and second-time MP from Bidar, told ET.

The quota decisions will help rally those castes, especially the SCs, behind the BJP and will further strengthen the party’s efforts to consolidate the Hindu votes in the only southern state where the party is in power, another senior BJP leader said.The leader said the BJP government in the state moved the Lingayats and Vokkaligas to a new category with a higher internal quota to achieve the twin objective of satisfying the demands of the Panchamasali Lingayats, a dominant subsect of the Lingayat community, and making inroads in to the Vokkaliga-dominated Mysuru-Karnataka region.

In Karnataka’s population, around 7% is STs, 17% is SCs, 14% is Lingayats and 11% is Vokkaligas. Both Lingayats and Vokkaligas belong to the OBC category.

Lacking a strong leader with pan-Karnataka appeal, the BJP will seek votes in Modi’s name with the prominent presence of Yediyurappa, a Lingayat leader with an appeal in other castes as well, BJP leaders said.

Recently, during his visit to Shivamogga, Modi was seen holding Yediyurappa’s hand in a gesture that party leaders feel was meant to acknowledge the former CM’s stature in Karnataka’s politics, party leaders said.

The BJP will give prominence also to its other influential caste leaders like Govind Karjol (SC), CT Ravi (Vokkailga) and B Sriramulu (ST).