Bengaluru: B S Yeddyurappa, the newly sworn-in chief minister of Karnataka, sailed through the floor test, securing the fate of his government for the remaining four-year term. The Congress-JD(S) coalition that stepped down from power last week did not even press for division of votes. The coalition, however, expressed its disdain over the manner in which the BJP formed government. "I oppose the confidence motion as it is immoral and unconstitutional," Congress legislature party leader Siddaramaiah said. "You cannot give a stable government at all," he added. "You should have thanked the 17 rebels for sitting there," H D Kumaraswamy, former chief minister and JD(S) leader said. The coalition has accused the BJP of engineering the crisis by luring Congress-JD(S) legislators to resign, eventually bringing down the 14-month old government.
Minutes after Yediyurappa won the trust vote in the Assembly, Speaker K R Ramesh tendered his resignation from the House. Handing over his resignation letter to Deputy Speaker Krishna Reddy, Kumar said during his 14-month-long tenure as Speaker, he had worked according to his “conscience” and in accordance with the Constitution. “I have upheld the dignity of office to the best of my ability,” he added. The House also passed the finance bill and the supplementary budget. The two sides got into a brief argument on the decision of the BJP to go for a vote on account for three months instead of the remainder of the eight months.
On Sunday, the speaker
had disqualified 14 rebel legislators – 11 from the Congress and three from the Janata Dal (S). The total number of disqualified MLAs went up to 17, bringing down the effective strength of the assembly to 208. Two of the disqualified MLAs, on the other hand, went the Supreme Court to challenge the Speaker’s action. But, later they withdrew the petition. All the disqualified MLAs were expecting to be inducted into the BJP cabinet. The disqualification bars the legislators from contesting Assembly polls for the term of the current Assembly - 46 more months unless mid-term polls are called - and also bars them from holding constitutional posts during this period.
I believe in forget and forgive policy: BSY
Among the first decisions of Yediyurappa as CM was the announcement of a £10 million loan waiver for weavers besides providing an additional Rs 4,000 each to farmers under the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana. The amount will be disbursed in the first two instalments of income support to farmers. Addressing media after chairing the first cabinet meeting, which was attended only by officials as no other minister was sworn in at the oath ceremony, Yediyurappa said he would not practice vendetta politics. “I believe in the policy of forget and forgive. I will not practice any vendetta or vindictive politics,” he said.
The turn of events that led to Yediyurappa being sworn in as CM was quite dramatic as there was no feedback from BJP’s central leadership and the state seemed headed for a brief spell of President’s rule. The state BJP team in Delhi was able to meet party chief Amit Shah only in snatches as the Union home minister was busy with parliamentary business. Later, a call from Shah to Yediyurappa paved the way for BSY's swearing.
