BENGALURU: On June 28, when Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy left for the United States on a private visit, he had the solid backing of 118 MLAs for his government. What he returned to on Sunday, however, was a coalition almost in tatters and on the verge of collapse, with 13 legislators belonging to the Congress, and his own party JDS, having deserted him.
In a span of one week, the Congress-JDS coalition has come crumbling down, threatening to dislodge Kumaraswamy from the Chief Minister’s chair. Hectic political activity was witnessed all through Sunday with the Congress senior leadership holding marathon meetings and party workers protesting. JDS too called for an emergency legislature party meeting. Late in the evening, Kumaraswamy expressed confidence that he will woo back the three of his party’s MLAs who have resigned.
Earlier in the day, Congress’ go-between D K Shivakumar tried his best to resolve differences with JDS supremo H D Deve Gowda. A discussion on a possible alternative Chief Minister yielded no results with the JDS chief refusing to accept Siddaramaiah and the Congress not keen on Mallikarjun Kharge. Sources close to Kharge added that the veteran leader, who was approached with the idea of taking over as CM, shot it down fearing similar backlash.
Gowda is said to have expressed “great disappointment” over the developments, almost regretting the tie-up with Congress in the first place.
Even as the Congress leadership, including Kharge, accused the BJP and its central leadership of sabotaging the coalition, the saffron party maintained that it had nothing to do with the developments and that it would swing into action the moment the present government loses its majority.
“Across the country, wherever there is an elected non-BJP government, the BJP has attempted to destabilise it by luring MLAs or using central agencies to pressure them into submission. BJP wants to destroy Congress and all other regional parties to establish an authoritarian state,” alleged Kharge.
Siddaramaiah went about his scheduled events before meeting AICC general secretary K C Venugopal for a series of meetings. Attempts by the party brass to reach out to rebel MLAs in Mumbai proved futile with the legislators categorically refusing to withdraw their resignations.
As it became clear that the party is unable to convince its rebel legislators to return, especially after Ramalinga Reddy and Ramesh Jarkiholi, who played key roles in the current wave of dissent, the Congress seems to be preparing to accept the inevitable — its position in the opposition. The party has called for a legislature party meeting, but interestingly, only on Tuesday. Sources in the party suggest that they intend to use the two days to woo back their legislators.