Udupi : Halady Srinivas Shetty, five-time Kundapur MLA, who failed to get a Ministerial berth, said that he had neither done caste politics nor lobbied for a ministerial berth.

Speaking to presspersons at Halady in Udupi district on Tuesday, Mr. Shetty said that he had not even been invited by the party for the swearing-in ceremony of Ministers in Bengaluru.

“I have not lobbied for Ministerial berth. I have not practised neither caste politics nor followed wrong methods in my political career. I do not know why I have been denied a Ministerial berth. You ask the top leaders of the party,” he said.

“The leaders who were denied Ministerial berths called for a meeting in Bengaluru. But I have not gone anywhere. I am here in my constituency. I will discuss the matter with my followers,” he said.

He said that he had always worked hard for the party. “Even when I was an Independent MLA, I worked for the victory of BJP candidates in gram panchayat, taluk panchayat and zilla panchayat polls,” Mr. Shetty said.

Meanwhile, the denial of Ministerial berth to Mr. Shetty, has disappointed his followers.

Mr. Shetty, who belongs to the Bunt community, is the senior-most BJP MLA in Udupi district and was considered a front-runner for a Ministerial berth. He had tough competition from the three-term MLC Kota Srinivas Poojary, also from the district, who had also served as the Leader of the Opposition in the Legislative Council till recently.

But luck favoured Mr. Poojary for the second time. In 2012, Mr. Shetty was informed that he had been selected for a Ministerial berth in the Jagadish Shettar government and he went to Bengaluru only to learn at the last minute that the party had chosen Mr. Kota Srinivas Poojary over him.

Mr. Shetty then resigned from the BJP for what he deemed an insult and contested as an Independent candidate and won from Kundapur Assembly constituency in the 2013 Assembly elections with the highest margin in Udupi district. He, however, returned to the BJP before the 2018 Assembly elections and retained the seat with the highest margin in the district.

In the 2019 parliamentary elections, it was the Kundapur Assembly constituency, which provided the highest lead for the BJP in the Udupi-Chikkamagaluru parliamentary constituency. Hence, it was assumed that Mr. Shetty would make it to the Cabinet this time.