Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (SP)

Bengaluru, Mar 2: Although all political parties and their leaders have been crisscrossing the state in a bid to woo voters as they anticipate Assembly election in the state to be held during mid-May as indicated by the chief election commissioner, Om Prakash Rawat, a notion has begun to spread that there are chances of Karnataka being picked for experimenting Prime Minister, Narendra Modi's idea of holding simultaneous elections for Lok Sabha and Assembly. Quoting sources, English daily, Deccan Chronicle, said that if this happens, the election in the state might be delayed by six months.

Polls for state assemblies of Rajasthan, Chattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh are due later this year. It has been claimed that the centre has written to the state government seeking to consider the practicability of deferring the Assembly election to November so that it can be held along with other states. This is being done under the Prime Minister's concept of 'one nation - one election' which will help save expenditure and deployment of huge manpower. It is also said that in the letter, the centre has clarified that it does not mind continuance of Siddaramaiah as the head of the caretaker government till the election is held.

Government sources contacted by the said newspaper however, were wary of confirming receipt of such a letter. The officials conceded that talk about deferring of the election is around since the last 15 days. So far, the central election commission has not come out with dates for the Assembly election, indicating that something is brewing.

This situation has led some people to speculate that BJP, which has sensed that Congress has an upper hand as far as general mood of the electorate is concerned in Karnataka at present, plans to bide time so that it gets some time to consolidate its position, as it is hell bent on snatching power from Congress in Karnataka. The tussle, which has already hotted up, is between Prime Minister, Modi, and chief minister, Siddaramaiah, with both hurling accusations at each other in various programmes.

These rumours have begun to float after a meeting of BJP chief ministers and deputy chief ministers in the country was convened at New Delhi on Sunday to discuss the prospects of giving affect to Modi's plan to hold simultaneous elections for Assembly and Lok Sabha.

However, constitutional experts are of the opinion that putting off Assembly election by six months at present is almost impracticable in the light of the prevailing situation.