New Delhi, October 5
Janata Dal (Secular) president H.D.Deve Gowda tonight told his BJP counterpart Rajnath Singh that the party has no intention to transfer power to the BJP notwithstanding the earlier agreement, inside sources said.
Gowda communicated his party's view to Singh at a meeting soon after an “inconclusive” meeting of the Political Affairs Committee of his party this evening. Although it was officially announced that Gowda will be meeting Singh at a mutually agreed common place tomorrow, the meeting took place tonight itself, a top JD (S) leader told UNI.
Sources, however, declined to reveal where the meeting
was held but indications are that it was held at the residence of industrialist turned Rajya Sabha MP Rajeev Chandrashekher.
Earlier, the meeting, attended by Karnataka Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy and home minister M.P. Prakash, apprised the JD (S) PAC about the 20-month old uneasy coalition with the BJP.
Under the agreement reached, the BJP was to get chief ministership from the JD (S) on October 3. The BJP ministers, including Deputy Chief Minister B.S.Yediyurappa, have resigned their posts while the Chief Minister has convened the legislative assembly session on October 18.
The BJP has scheduled its Parliamentary Board’s meeting for tomorrow morning and the meeting with Gowda and Singh was to take place before it. The board made it clear at its yesterday’s meeting that the issue of transfer of power to BJP for the rest of the 20-month term and chief ministership to B.S. Yediyurappa was “non-negotiable”. Meanwhile, Karnataka BJP Legislature Party Leader, Yediyurappa led a delegation of state MPs to party leadership asking them to get a final word from the JD (S) on transfer of power to the BJP by tomorrow evening, failing which the party should permit the Karnataka Legislature party to withdraw its support to the government. Asked about this statement, JD(S) secretary general Kunwar Danish Ali said it was a matter between Yediyurappa and his party.
New Delhi, October 5
Even as the scheduled meeting between JD (S) supremo H.D. Deve Gowda and BJP chief Rajnath Singh was postponed for tomorrow, the saffron party today admitted that entering into an alliance with the JD (S) was a "wrong assessment" on its part and it was now ready for a snap poll if the pact in Karnataka was not honoured.
Senior BJP leader M Venkaiah Naidu, who was one of the architects of the alliance with the JD (S) resulting in the formation of the coalition government 20 months ago, said he had believed H.D.
Kumaraswamy‘s words that he had non-Congress blood in him when he parted ways with it and his father Deve Gowda.
“We don't consider it as a mistake. We have made a wrong assessment that can be the correct description”, Naidu observed this during an interview on Karan Thapar's Devil's Advocate programme for CNN-IBN when asked whether he thought the alliance with the JD (S) was a mistake.
