Bengaluru, Feb 8: Ahead of the state budget, Karnataka Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy on Friday morning removed disgruntled Congress MLA Dr Umesh Jadhav from the post of the chairman of the Warehouse Corporation. Pratap Gowda Patil will be replacing Jadhav.
Meanwhile, Congress MLA from Raichur Basanagouda Daddal has been appointed as the chairman of Maharshi Valmiki Scheduled Tribes Development Board, news agency ANI reported.
The development comes a day after seven MLAs from Congress and three from Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), skipped the Assembly’s budget session. The seven Congress MLAs include Dr Umesh Jadhav, Dr Sudhakar, Ramesh Jarkiholi, Mahesh Kumathalli, BC Patil, Nagendra B, and JN Ganesh.
On Thursday, the BJP legislators disrupted the state Assembly, claiming that the Congress-JDS coalition government no longer has a majority. The saffron party, has, however, not planned to move a no-confidence motion or meet Governor Vajubhai Wala to disqualify the coalition government as yet.
To pacify the rebellious MLAs, Congress has reportedly called its legislature party meeting today, while the party leadership has expressed confidence that all its legislators will be present for the budget.
Congress and Janata Dal-Secular (JDS), which have 80 and 37 MLAs respectively in the 224-member Assembly, have been at the loggerheads ever since they formed the coalition government in Karnataka in May last year. The absence of Congress MLAs from the first and second day of this year budget session has fuelled the speculation of resentment between both the parties.
Earlier, former Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah accused BJP of horse-trading, claiming that the party offered more than Rs 30 crore to lure Congress MLAs.
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