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New Delhi/Bangalore, Jan 28 (PTI): Bharatiya Janata Party chief Rajnath Singh on Monday said he is confident that Karnataka Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar’s BJP government will complete its tenure, even though 13 legislators have said they are resigning from the Assembly.
Rajnath Singh’s statement came after Shettar met him in New Delhi.
The Shettar government has taken on the disgruntled legislators by petitioning the Speaker to disqualify them for 'anti-party' activities.
But the Speaker was out of town and unable to receive either the resignation letters or the petition.
At his meeting with Singh, Shettar discussed the course of action following the resignation of legislators loyal to B S Yeddyurappa.
Emerging from the meeting, Shettar said, “Till now, no MLA has resigned. So, we have to wait and see what is going on.... Let us see.”
Asked about the crisis in the state, both Singh and Shettar expressed confidence that the BJP government would complete its full term.
“There is no crisis in Karnataka Government. Our Karnataka Government will definitely complete its full term,” Singh told reporters before the meeting.
On Friday, Singh had asked Shettar not to compromise on the BJP's principles even if it threatens the survival of the government in the southern state.
Last Thursday, 13 BJP MLAs loyal to Yeddyurappa, chief of the recently launched Karnataka Janata Party (KJP), went to the Speaker's office to submit their resignations from the Assembly but could not do so as Bopaiah was out of station.
They then trooped into the Raj Bhavan and appealed to Governor H R Bhardwaj to intervene and ensure that their resignations are accepted by the Speaker. The 13 later also sent their resignations to Bopaiah by e-mail.
Two MLAs -- Thippeswamy and Vittala Katakadonda (who were part of the 13 MLAs who wanted to resign last Thursday) -- did not figure in the list of 12 MLAs submitted to the Speaker's office. But the name of Sunil Valyapure, who the KJP claimed had also resigned taking their grouping's strength to 14, was included.
Gopalakrishna urged the Speaker to first consider their petition seeking disqualification - and not the resignation letters. “We are the first to file the petition. They have not resigned (resignation letters have not reached the Speaker)”, he said.
The bone of contention now appears to be the budget slated to be presented on February 8.
Yeddyurappa is hell-bent on preventing Shettar from presenting it, apprehending that the latter would try to carve out a political constituency for himself and BJP might come out with populist schemes in the election year, denting KJP's prospects.
In the 225-member Assembly, BJP has 117 excluding the Speaker and it requires 113 for a simple majority. Congress has 71 members and JDS 26. There are seven Independents and two vacancies. One member is nominated.
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