BENGALURU: A landmark decision on Saturday, with the trademark stamp of Siddaramaiah all over it, sealed the fate of the Congress JDS coalition which is now dead in the water. The Congress has decided to fight alone in the bypolls and the formal announcement was made by KPCC president Dinesh Gundu Rao on Saturday.
Siddaramaiah and Gundu Rao had carried this proposal to the central leadership recently and they received permission to make the announcement. While the partners did stick it out so far in spite of a lot of infighting, there is no one left in the Congress to oppose the decision to ‘go it alone’, probably leading to the decision.
“We are busy with strengthening our party. What shape things take in the future, we will have to wait and see,” Gundu Rao said at a meeting held at the KPCC office in the city. Legislature party leader Siddaramaiah was also present at the meeting. Sources said that the issue had also come up for discussion at the state Congress Committees and CLP leaders meeting in Delhi a couple of days ago. During that meeting, the Karnataka unit took up the issue of the upcoming bypolls even though the elections have not been notified yet. It may be recalled that while JDS supremo H D Deve Gowda too had announced earlier that the coalition was dead, he had said that the party would wait for the decision of the Congress high command.
According to observers, however, the situation could change in the future with two important developments. The announcement of a new opposition leader or KPCC chief could see a new direction or things could change if the JDS and Congress manage to win a majority of the 17 seats which will go to polls as they would again have a majority if the coalition is reconvened. If the KPCC chief’s post goes to someone like H K Patil, D K Shivakumar or G Parameshwara, there could be some change.
On Saturday, Congress came up with a SWOT analysis for each constituency and decided to meet again on September 18 to discuss flood damage and the actions of the present government amid allegations of step-motherly treatment in the release of funds for constituencies of Congress legislators.
Meanwhile, former DyCM Parameshwara hit out at the government for revising the industrial cluster decision of the previous government and dropping the idea of having them at Kalaburagi, Bidar and Tumakuru while considering one in Shivamogga.