BJP banks on 17 musketeers who helped form govt to tilt scale in Karnataka poll
By Our Special Correspondent
New Delhi, April 24: ‘Operational Kamala’ had netted 17 Congress MLAs who had helped the Bharatiya Janata Party wrest power in Karnataka after former Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa had to resign after dramatic appearances in the state Assembly while also shedding tears. The BJP continues to trust the 17 such Congress rebels in the ongoing Karnataka Assembly elections.
The BJP has fielded all the 17 rebels from the Congress ranks. The byelections were held in the state and one such MLA had lost the poll. But the BJP has fielded all the 17 leaders who had helped the saffron outfit gain power in Karnataka with Yediyurappa as the chief minister.
Among the Congress rebels were S T Somashekar (Yashvantpur), Byrati Basavaraj (K.R. Puram), B.C. Patil (Hirekerur), Dr K.Sudhakar (Chikkaballapur), MTB Nagaraj (Hosakote), and Muniratna (Rajarajeshwari nagar). Nagraj had lost the byelection, but the BJP had ensured that he returned to the legislative council to be a minister in the state.
“The 17 Congress MLAs came from all across the regions of Congress. They are formidable faces in their respective regions. Congress has not been able to find replacements for them even now. The BJP has shown strong faith in their strengths and left them undisturbed even while surgical operations were conducted against several others in the party in Karnataka,” said a senior BJP functionary.
By ensnaring a large number of Congress MLAs in Karnataka to form the government, the BJP had demonstrated its new-found expertise to wrest power even if the party was short of number in the state Assemblies. The Karnataka model of government formation was later employed in Madhya Pradesh after Union Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia gifted the state on a platter to the BJP and helped Shivraj Singh Chauhan become chief minister again of the state.
The fear of the BJP as a poacher appears still weighing on Congress, as its chief Mallikarjuna Kharge in a rally in Karnataka called upon the people to help elect the party with over 150 seats in the May10 election. Karnataka Assembly has a total of 224 seats. While the BJP and Congress are dominant players in the state politics, Janata Dal (Secular), counting on the Vokkaliga support base, stays as the third pole of the state politics.
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