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If a poll is conducted to find out the happiest man in Karnataka on Saturday, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah will win hands down.

Both candidates of the ruling Congress -- in Bangalore Rural and in Mandya Lok Sabha constituencies -- won handsomely in the bypoll.

What must have gladdened Siddaramaiah’s heart is that his bete noire H.D. Deve Gowda’s daughter-in-law Anita Kumaraswamy lost in Bangalore Rural by over 1,37,000 votes and Kannada actress Ramya won in Mandya by over 67000 votes. 

Siddharamaiah rubbed it in by dubbing the JD-S an "Appa makkal party" (Father and Sons Party). And the fact that the Congress could best the alliance between the JD-S, the BJP and the KJP would give this former Janata Dal leader immense satisfaction.

What does this mean for the nataka (theatre) of Karnataka politics? Seven important lessons in fact. 

1. The JD-S, the BJP and the KJP will have to go back to the drawing board to do a SWOT analysis in different regions of Karnataka.

What looked a formidable partnership on paper came apart in polling booths with voters choosing to side with the ruling party. None of the three parties can afford a similar showing in the Lok Sabha elections next year. 

2. The coming together of the three parties was also an attempt to bring the Vokkaliga and Lingayat vote bank under one umbrella. There are elements within these parties uncomfortable with the idea of a chief minister from the backward classes ruling the state.

Now the leaders will have to check out if the transfer of votes took place from the BJP and the KJP (even though both are not strong in this territory) to the JD-S kitty in these bypolls. 

3. The minorities were clearly unhappy with Kumaraswamy cosying up to the BJP yet again. He has faced a credibility crisis since 2006 with Muslims suspicious of what turn he would take in his political career.

Now his bhajan of "Dad does not approve but I’m open to support from the BJP" is not going down well with his core voter base.

Kumaraswamy may now be forced to listen to Deve Gowda but the does the family have the formula to win back Mandya and Bangalore Rural next year is the big question.

4. Political analyst Hemantha Kumar points out that the BJP lost deposit in 111 constituencies in the Karnataka assembly polls in May. This roughly translates to about 13 Lok Sabha seats, which means the BJP has a lot of work to do if it wants to do well next year. Just Narendra Modi may not be enough. Which is why the BJP looked at these bypolls as a test, and even let former deputy chief minister R. Ashoka to campaign for Anitha Kumaraswamy.

Had the JD-S retained its seats, the BJP would have looked at forming a rainbow coalition. But now it may look at only Yeddyurappa to shore itself up in other parts of Karnataka. 

5. Had Siddharamaiah’s candidates lost the polls, it would have weakened his position in the government.

But even after the wins, he has a problem at hands.

D.K. Shivakumar, whose brother D.K. Suresh defeated Anita, will now once again stake his claim for a cabinet berth. He was kept out in May on charges that he did not have a clean image but now the Congress would find it difficult to ignore his claims.

6. In Bidadi, where Kumaraswamy and his wife voted on Wednesday, someone commented that it was strange that the party’s name is JD-Secular despite cosying up to the BJP.

Deve Gowda’s argument is that the question of support by the BJP should be posed to that party, and not to him. "I did not go to them asking for support," he said.

7. Despite the defeat, the possibility of the JD-S, the BJP and the KJP coming together with the BJP acting as the glue cannot be ruled out. Because fighting separately, the divided opposition would be handing over a majority of the 28 Lok Sabha seats to the Congress on a platter.

Within Bangalore Rural lies Ramanagaram, the place where Ramesh Sippy’s Sholay was shot in the ’70s. In keeping with the film’s spirit, the area saw Kumaraswamy, Yeddyurappa and the BJP sing `Yeh dosti hum nahi chodenge’ in Gabbar Singh territory. All eyes will now be on whether the three can get together to score a blockbuster, after coming up with a cropper at the electoral box-office the first time round. 

(T.S. Sudhir is Editor (South), Headlines Today)