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This article was first published 12 years ago

K'taka crisis: BJP to parade its MLAs before President Patil

Last updated on: May 16, 2011 15:30 IST

Image: Karnataka CM B S Yeddyurappa
Vicky Nanjappa

Following orders from the National Democratic Alliance, the Bharatiya Janata Party has decided to parade its MLAs before the President Pratibha Patil. The MLAs will be taken to New Delhi in three batches starting Monday evening. They would first meet the party high command and if the need be the MLAs would be paraded before the president on Tuesday.

The BJP government in Karnataka decided to hold the legislature session from June 2. An emergency cabinet meeting headed by Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa was held on Monday afternoon in Bengaluru following which the decision to convene the session was taken. Following the meeting a letter to the effect was written to the Governor H R Bhardwaj, who will need to give his nod to convene the session.

The parading of the MLAs will take place as the Union cabinet takes a final call on the governor's recommendation, which had asked for the imposition of president's rule in Karnataka.

Taking on Bhardwaj, the NDA decided to meet Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh to demand his dismissal. "The NDA strongly condemns the action of Governor of Karnataka in sending a report to the Central government. The governor's conduct is partisan. It defies all constitutional norms and principles. There is absolutely no doubt that the Yeddyurappa government enjoys an overwhelming majority in the assembly," senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley told mediapersons.

He maintained that as a result of the Supreme Court judgment, the 11 suspended MLAs have been held to be members of the BJP and were bound by its whip.

With inputs from PTI

...

NDA to meet PM to demand Bhardwaj's dismissal

Image: Karnatak Governor H R Bhardwaj
The NDA decided to meet the prime minister to raise this issue and demand recall of Governor Bhardwaj.

"We intend to raise two specific issues with the prime minister. Firstly, this report is unconstitutional and obviously must be rejected by the central government. And secondly, the governor of Karnataka repeatedly is indulging in unconstitutionality. And so, for defying the constitution he should be recalled as governor," Jaitley said.

The NDA leadership has also asked Yeddyurappa to parade the MLAs in front of the president to prove that he has the numbers. "We shall take all the MLAs supporting the government to the President and demonstrate our strength in front of Rashtrapati Bhawan since a floor test is no longer required," Jaitley said.

Bhardawj has acted unconstitutionally: Jaitley

Image: The Karnataka assembly
The "urgent meeting" of the NDA leaders was held at the residence of their Working President L K Advani to discuss the issue arising out of Bhardwaj's report which is said to have recommended president's rule in Karnataka.

Jaitley maintained that these 11 suspended MLAs have taken back the letter they wrote on October 6, 2010 withdrawing support to the Yeddyurappa government. "The MLAs have themselves said they support the government," he added.

The NDA maintained that 121 MLAs support the Yeddyurappa-led BJP government in Karnataka while the opposition has only 97 in the 225-member Assembly.

The Bharatiya Janata Party is also miffed at Bhardwaj for not heeding to the chief minister's advise to call a special session of the assembly on Monday.

"The logical course would have been to have a floor test. As long as a government is in majority the governor is bound by the constitution to act as per its advice. Bhardawj has acted unconstitutionally in not going by the advise of the council of ministers," Jaitley said.
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