BENGALURU: With rebel MLAs likely to abstain from the assembly proceedings, the BJP seems to be confident of defeating the trust vote to bring down the government.
“This government has been reduced to a minority and the CM will resign,” senior BJP leader CT Ravi told The New Sunday Express in an exclusive interview. Excerpts of the interview:
Was BJP taken aback by HDK’s decision to seek a trust vote?
No. After taking over as the Chief Minister, BS Yeddyurappa too had sought a trust vote as per Supreme Court directions. Kumaraswamy too will resign after making a speech in the Assembly as he will not be able to win the trust vote without the numbers. They do not have the required numbers. They just have 101 members with them, while BJP has 107. We do not need a mathematician to understand this simple calculation. We are 100 per cent confident of defeating the trust vote.
But Congress is reaching out to its rebel MLAs to convince them...
According to information that we have, they are trying but have not been able to convince their MLAs. It is too late.
Why has BJP taken its MLAs to a resort? Are you concerned about reverse poaching?
We do not have any such fears. They are trying to approach our MLAs through political brokers. They will also spread rumours to create confusion among MLAs. Every day we are getting messages from our workers about MLAs being approached. To avoid any confusion and to stop rumours from being spread, we have decided to stay together.
BJP is being accused of engineering the current political crisis in the state. What do you have to say?
Only those who are ignorant of political developments make such allegations. Vishwanath was JDS state president, but he was not even made a member of the coordination committee and not given due respect within his party. When his self-respect was hurt he resigned.
What is BJP’s role in it? Why did Ramalinga Reddy, one of the senior most leaders, leave the party?
As a political opponent, the BJP will try to disturb them, but if they have a proper understanding between them we could not have done anything. This is not a ‘dosti government’ formed by two friendly parties, but a ‘dushman’ government formed by two parties that keep fighting.