Bengaluru: In a breather to Karnataka’s Congress-JD(S) coalition, Speaker Ramesh Kumar Tuesday said that eight out of the 13 resignations are “not in order” and have asked them to submit their letters again. He has also asked the rest of the five MLAs to personally meet him to discuss their resignations. While this is likely to give more time to the wobbly 13-month-old government, another Congress MLA R Roshan Baig also joined the group of dissidents Tuesday.
Speaker Kumar was not in office when the 10 Congress and three JD(S) lawmakers had submitted their resignations Saturday. He said that eight resignations were not in the prescribed format under Rule 202 of the Karnataka legislature procedure. If the MLAs are intent on reiterating their stance, the speaker said, they will have to submit their resignations again.
The speaker’s office also confirmed that Anand Singh, Ramalinga Reddy, Pratap Gowda Patil, Narayan Gowda and Gopalaiah have been asked to meet Kumar.
“I have asked three of the MLAs to meet me on 12 July and two others on 15 July,” Kumar told the media in Bengaluru.
Siddaramaiah, the state Congress Legislature Party leader, on the other hand, said that the party will seek disqualification of the 10 rebel MLAs and prevent them from contesting polls for six years. The former chief minister also asked them to “come back or face consequences”.
Interestingly, the Congress has sought disqualification of all their rebel MLAs barring one – Ramalinga Reddy.
“These resignations are not voluntary. All MLAs who attended the Congress Legislature Party (CLP) meet Tuesday have reiterated their loyalty to the party. Others who failed to attend it had taken prior permission,” said Siddaramaiah, minutes after the CLP meet ended.
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Losing majority
The entire H.D. Kumaraswamy cabinet had resigned Monday to enable a reshuffling and make room for the dissident lawmakers. But there has been no immediate word from the rebel camp who have been holed up in Mumbai.
The two independents – H. Nagesh and R. Shankar – who were made ministers only a month ago also withdrew support to the government and expressed allegiance to the BJP.
To prevent more exits, the JD(S) has now put up its remaining lawmakers at a resort in the outskirts of Bengaluru.
With 14 MLAs resigning from the coalition, Kumaraswamy’s government now faces the threat of losing its majority if the resignations are accepted. The Congress-JD(S)’ total strength is 116 in the 224-member House, where the half way mark is 113.
The BJP, in the meanwhile, has 107 MLAs including the support of the two independents.
If the resignations are accepted, the coalition’s tally will be reduced to 102.
Anti-defection law
The disqualification petition filed by the Congress against its dissident leaders has been based on the claims that these resignations “were not voluntary”.
“The speaker has no power to disqualify the MLAs. But he can determine whether the resignations are genuine and submitted voluntarily. If evidences fail to support that the resignations were made under pressure, he cannot reject them,” said Mahadev Prakash, a political analyst.
In April, the Congress had sought disqualification of Chincholi MLA Umesh Jadhav under the anti-defection law, alleging that the BJP had tried to lure legislators from both JD(S) and the grand old party.
Congress had also submitted audio tapes that purportedly contained conversations showing senior BJP leader B.S. Yeddyurappa bribing opposition MLAs. But speaker Kumar had ruled out that Jadhav’s resignation was made under pressure.
Jadhav later went on to win the Gulbarga Lok Sabha seat for the BJP by defeating Congress veteran Mallikarjun Kharge.
The Congress has again evoked the anti-defection law in its petition and requested the speaker to reject the resignation letters based on circumstantial evidence to show they were involuntary.
“The evidence submitted by the Congress can be in the form of photographs, videos or audio tapes. But the speaker can also examine if they are morphed. In Jadhav’s case, the speaker after careful consideration had made it clear that his resignation was voluntary,” Prakash added.
If the legislators are disqualified, they will not be able to hold any post in the government until they get re-elected either as independents or as members of another political party, explained Karnataka Congress Chief Dinesh Gundurao.
When asked if the Congress will accept the rebel legislators back into the party fold, senior Congress leader V S Ugrappa said, “The party is like a mother. Legislators must know that a mother sacrifices everything. If they are going to deceive their mother, nobody will appreciate them. People of Karnataka are clever and they will wait for an opportunity to teach the dissidents a lesson.”
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“If people of Karnataka are clever…” if they were, people like Kumarasamy Gowda would not have got even those seats with which he formed govt and fooling people.