Amid strong indications that BJP president Nitin Gadkari had given marching orders to Karnataka chief minister B.S. Yeddyurappa, his arch-rival, JD(S) leader H.D. Kumaraswamy, released damning details of yet another land scam here on Sunday. Sources here said, meanwhile, that an angry chief minister was refusing to take any calls from top party leaders in New Delhi and might be unwilling to go quietly.
The sources indicated that the chief minister had been asked to fly to New Delhi on the first flight out of Bengaluru on Monday so that he can announce his resignation before Parliament convenes later in the morning. His main detractor within the party, Mr Ananth Kumar, meanwhile finally came out into the open and reportedly pitched strongly for the post. Party bigwigs, however, seemed to veer towards another brahmin who is considered Mr Clean, incumbent state law minister Suresh Kumar, who remains the front-runner.
Mr Yeddyurappa, who set out for the airport thrice on Sunday and cancelled all three flight bookings, was reportedly asked to step down by party president Nitin Gadkari after a meeting of the BJP’s central core committee in New Delhi. State unit president K.S. Eshwarappa, the only state party leader to have been kept in the loop by the central leaders, has hinted that an angry Mr Yeddyurappa might defy Mr Gadkari’s diktat even though he has been given the face-saving option of nominating his successor.
This could either be former home minister and RSS favourite V.S. Acharya or public works minister C.M. Udasi. The top brass, however, has already scotched Dr Acharya as he is said to be too soft on Mr Yeddyurappa, while the reaction to the choice of a Lingayat successor in Mr Udasi is not known. Another contender, panchayati raj minister Jagadish Shettar, allied with Mr Ananth Kumar, may have blotted his copybook by aligning with the Reddy brothers during their failed rebellion last year.
Claiming that he had the backing of 110 legislators, and not 15 as had been reported on Saturday, the chief minister has sent several Cabinet colleagues and Members of Parliament to call on the party president and plead for his continuance in office. Two of his emissaries — Mr Udasi and D.B. Chandre Gowda, MP (Bangalore North) — met Mr Gadkari Sunday evening and requested him not to ease out Mr Yeddyurappa. “He (Gadkari) has not taken any decision, so there’s no question of a change of leadership in Karnataka,” Mr Udasi told this newspaper.
Mr Chandre Gowda said: “I told the president that it is not in the larger interest of the party to change the leader. He has won several elections for the party and has ensured an excellent law and order situation in our state. Besides, there’s no constitutional crisis in Karnataka. So how can we go by
the word of the Opposition and change our leader. Mr Gadkari heard us patiently, but did not speak his mind,” Mr Gowda said.
Party sources said the consensus among leaders who met at Mr Gadkari’s residence in New Delhi — L.K. Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi, Rajnath Singh and Sushma Swaraj — was that it would be embarrassing for the party if Mr Yeddyurappa did not quit voluntarily at a time when the party was attacking Prime Minister Manmohan Singh over the 2G spectrum allocation scam.
Sources close to the chief minister fear that Mr Yeddyurappa, in refusing to resign, might run the danger of being expelled by the party, and that his close aides were counselling him to tread with caution.