'Horse-trading' of MLAs in Full Swing as Yeddy Braces for Floor Test on Oct 11
Gabriel Vaz
Daijiworld Media Network - Bangalore
Bangalore, Oct 6: Given an ultimatum by governor Hans Raj Bhardwaj to prove the BJP government’s majority in the state Legislative Assembly by 5 pm on October 12, the chief minister has arranged to convene the assembly session on October 11 morning for a trial of strength on the floor of the house.
With as many as 19 ruling party legislators, including seven ministers, who had submitted a joint letter informing the governor about their decision to withdraw support to the Yeddyurappa regime unmindful of the chief ministers move to sack four independents who had been rewarded with cabinet ministership for extending their support to the BJP government, the chief minister’s camp as well as opposition Congress and JD(S) leadership have started wooing legislators to muster support.
If the ruling party legislators, including independents, remain firm in their decision of withdrawing support to the Yeddyurappa regime during the crucial floor test in the assembly commencing on Monday October 11, it is obvious that the BJP will be reduced to a minority and will be forced to quit.
BJP reduced to ''minority” in the Assembly
In the 224-member Assembly, BJP and Independents together had a strength of 123 and with today’s developments it has been reduced to 104 reducing the ruling party to a minority. BJP requires the support of 113 members to prove its majority. BJP earlier had 117 MLAs including the Speaker, followed by Congress 73, JDS 28 and independents six. Of the six independents, Varthur Prakash, a known loyalist of Siddaramaiah, has already dissociated himself from BJP and had recently joined the JD(S).
Surprisingly, the chief minister himself went to the extent of openly accusing the JD(S) state president and former chief minister H D Kumaraswamy and his party of offering Rs 20 to 30 crore to the dissident BJP MLAs in a bid to topple the government. However, the opposition leaders are claiming that the chief minister and his loyalists are themselves engaged in ''horse-trading” to win back support of the dissidents and even ''lure” friendly MLAs from Congress and JD(S) with mind-boggling amounts of Rs 30 to 40 crore being offered.
In a separate statement, Siddarmaiah accused the chief minister of resorting to ''horse-trading” offering as much as Rs 25 to 30 crore to the dissident MLAs and even trying to convince some of the Congress and JD(S) MLAs to either abstain during the legislature session or resign their assembly membership as part of another round of ''Operation Kamala” by offering even higher amounts of Rs 40 to 50 crore each.
Yeddy to seek divine blessings in Kerala
Meanwhile, the chief minister has decided to make a flying visit the Bhagawati temple at Thazhiparambu near Kannur in Kerala on Thursday to seek divine blessings and support for survival of the government.
Both the Congress and JD(S) leaders held separate meetings to finalise their strategies. Even JD(S) leader M C Nanaiah, a confidant of the JD(S) supremo H D Deve Gowda and former chief minister Kumaraswamy, visited the residence of Congress opposition leader Siddaramaiah’s residence for coordination of their efforts.
Though Yeddyurappa’s staunch supporters like Home and Transport minister R Ashok, Water Resources minister Basavaraj Bommai and Health and Family Welfare minister B Sriramulu, a close confidant cum associate of Bellary mining lord Gali Janardhna Reddy, who is the Tourism and Infrastructure Development minister, had rushed to Chennai last night to hold negotiations with the dissidents and win back their support, Ashok and Bommai returned to Bangalore to participate in the emergency cabinet meeting convened by the chief minister this morning.
Ashok later told reporters that he will return to hold further round of talks with the disgruntled MLAs, even as it was learnt that more than a dozen legislators had decided to shift to Cochin. Incidentally, Janardhana Reddy, who had first raised the banner of revolt against Yeddyurappa and later acceded to the mediation by Sushma Swaraj, had also rushed to Chennai and reportedly met the dissidents at the airport. In the meanwhile, Sriramulu, who stayed back with the dissidents last night and on Wednesday as well, has indicated that he was prepared to quit for making way for accommodating the dissidents if his resignation was able to patch-up the differences and satisfy the disgruntled party legislators.
Zameer Khan and Puttanna rush to Chennai
In an interesting development, JD(S) leader and transport operator Z A Zameer Ahmed Khan, who is considered very close to Kumaraswamy, and Puttanna, deputy chairman in the Legislative Council, rushed to Chennai for holding secret confabulations with the dissidents. Zameer Khan even managed to bring Anand Asnotikar and Balachandra Jarkiholi to Bangalore and ''convince” them to meet the governor by offering the letter on withdrawal of support to the Yeddyurappa regime.
The dissident legislators, who had demanded that recently dropped ministers like Goolihatti Shekar and Shivanagouda Naik, be reinstated and two-term party MLA Gopalakrishna Belur should be inducted into the cabinet.
Earlier in the day, the chief minister, who had been facing a barrage of allegations about indulging in nepotism to favour his sons and relatives through denotification of prime land in and around Bangalore while another of his staunch loyalist and Housing and Information minister Katta Subramanya Naidu was facing charges of being involved in obtaining compensation from the KIADB for government lands, tried to turn the tables against the Deve Gowda family and Kumaraswamy.
''Kumaraswamy should not hurl baseless allegations against me and criticise me about the fly in my plate when his plate is full of dead bandicoots,” Yeddyurappa said.
Deve Gowda family ''is the biggest curse to state”
''Deve Gowda and his sons H D Kumaraswamy, H D Revanna and Balakrishna Gowda and their family are the biggest curse to the state,” Yeddyurappa said and alleged that Deve Gowda and his family had purchased 4,000 acres of benami lands in and around Bangalore.
Apart from issuing denotifications for dropping acquisition of lands during the 20 month JD(S)-BJP coalition rule, Deve Gowda and his family purchased benami lands in and around Bangalore. ''Kumaraswamy was jealous of the BJP government’s achievements, and levelling charges against him and the government for the last one week to create confusion among the people about the government’s stability,” Yeddyurappa said.
“The father (Deve Gowda) and sons are biggest curse to the state” and JD(S) has no capacity to come to power on its own. The JD (S) is making all attempts to come to power through the backdoor. The people will teach a fitting lesson to the JD (S) in the coming days,” he claimed.
Alleging that Kumaraswamy has hatched a political conspiracy to destabilise the government headed by him by ''offering Rs. 20 crore to Rs. 30 crore to each dissident MLA,” Yeddyurappa sought an explanation from the Deve Gowda family for the source of such a disproportionate income.
Admitting that he had allotted a housing site to his son B Y Raghavendra, MP, the chief minister said the Kumaraswamy government denotified 45.38 acres in 19 villages around Bangalore. The Mysore Development Authority has allotted 32 housing sites for Deve Gowda and his relatives in Mysore by totally violating all laws. ''Now sites are worth Rs. 100 crore. The Deve Gowda family also purchased a lot of properties in Padmanabhanagar in the City,” he alleged.
Balakrishna Gowda, another son of Deve Gowda, has purchased 34.01 acres benami lands around peripheral ring road in the City, Yeddyurappa said disclosing details of a large number of irregularities of the Kumaraswamy government and the involvement of Deve Gowda family in purchase of lands in benami names will be brought to the public’s notice in a phased manner.
Congress should not enter into ''unholy” alliance with JD(S)
The people would not support the Congress, which learnt a bitter lesson after topping the Dharam Singh government, if it entered into an unholy alliance with the JD(S) to form the government again. The national Congress leaders should see this development in the state and advise the state leaders properly, Yeddyurapa said.
''I had committed mistake by joining hands with the JD(S) once. But people blessed me. Now you (Congress) don’t repeat the mistake for the second time after burning your fingers and hands by joining hands with the JD(S) again,” the chief minister said.
''All records related to land scams will be placed before the House. Come, we are ready for a detailed debate. We will reveal misuse of power by the Kumaraswamy government. I will give printouts on all land scams to all MLAs and MPs before I reply in the House and even publish booklets giving all documentary evidence,” he said.
He pointed out that the government had decided to convene a special session of the state legislature in the first week of November to debate land scams.
Meanwhile, Kumaraswamy alleged that the chief minister was frustrated and lost his mental balance as he was afraid of losing power with more than 20 MLAs withdrawing support. ''If the chief minister can prove any irregularity committed by me, I am prepared to retire from politics,”he said.
''He has leveled false and baseless allegations against me and my family members. I am prepared to face any inquiry. Let him order a CBI probe into all land scams committed by him and other ministers in the government, including the scandals of Katta Subramanya Naidu, Murugesh Nirani. If it pleases him, let him include all the allegations leveled by him against me during my 20-month rule when BJP was the coalition partner,” he said.