If there is one welcome outcome from the fast-moving political developments in Karnataka, it is the arrival of a young professional leadership in the Congress. It had learned the lessons from Goa, Manipur and Assam and was not to be outwitted by the BJP again.
For the first time, the Congress kept one step ahead of the saffron party, checkmating it at every level in Karnataka. Political parties have hailed the defeat of the Yeddyurappa interlude as a victory for the Supreme Court, which intervened effectively, not once but twice. But this miraculous intervention was possible only because of the alertness of the Congress.
The battle for Karnataka may prove a turning point for India. Clearly, no more will elections be one-sided affair. Gujarat had given a hint of this. Karnataka has confirmed that under Gandhi the Congress is rejuvenated. The fierce campaigning had hardly prepared us for the post-election drama. The Tamil Nadu experience when AIADMK legislators were held in captivity for several days in a hideaway to forestall poaching by rival groups appeared kids’ stuff compared to what happened in Bengaluru. Here, a chief minister who had yet to prove his majority used the police to get across to rival legislators and prevent them from leaving the capital. This was an extraordinary step but did not get the condemnation it deserved, because more mindboggling events were taking place!
The onus now is on the Congress, which must work the coalition with the Janata Dal (Secular). Both parties get their primary support from the same political base and are ideologically aligned. But both will find the burdens of the past relationship challenging to shed. Outgoing chief minister, Siddaramaiah’s troubled relations with the JD (S) patriarch Deve Gowda, had prevented the two parties from reaching an electoral arrangement to keep the BJP at bay. The two ran rival campaigns, in some constituencies pitting one against the other. The bitterness of the campaign may not be easy to forget.
The Congress knows that the emerging leaders may need to be given the responsibility of managing affairs in the coalition. A former socialist and himself an old JD (S) leader with a clean record as a chief minister, Siddaramaiah perhaps made too many enemies. He cultivated his constituency of middle and lower-middle-class voters through several popular schemes, including own version of Jayalalithaa’s Amma Canteen. But his one primary weapon of offering to try and get a separate religion status to the powerful Lingayats in the State, did not fetch him votes. The results showed that the Congress suffered severe reverses in the southern districts, a stronghold of the Vokkaligas a majority of whom stood with the JD (S). The coastal region, cultivated by the BJP with its communal campaign went with the saffron party. The BJP also gained in the Bombay Karnataka region where the Congress lost ground. In
a period of consolidation, the party may look to moneyed leaders like D K Shivakumar to regain the political initiative.
Chief Minister Kumaraswamy begins with a fund of goodwill among the regional leaders around the country. Kumaraswamy has also taken the right steps to mend fences with the Congress. The hope among the two coalition partners must be that the tie-up will weather all obstacles if only because of the burden of carrying so much of the national political weight and hope.
THE DRAMA, STEP BY SHAMEFUL STEP
15 May
By noon, the BJP had run away to a comfortable majority. TV channels were talking of 120 seats. Soon the Congress pulled back and by the end of the day it became clear that there would be a hung assembly.
16 May
Then came the masterstroke from the Congress leadership: the party offered the JD (S) the post of chief minister. This was readily accepted and the two parties, with a combined strength of 116, had the majority. The BJP with 104 seats was the largest single party and decided to stake its claim. Amid all the drama in front of the Raj Bhavan where all three parties marshalled their leaders, there was silence from the Governor. Vadhubhai Vala waited for nightfall to give his verdict: he called the BJP leader to form the government and announced that he would be sworn in the next day.
May 17
Sworn in the morning, Yeddy went MLA shopping. Quickly getting his favourite police officers into positions, he lifted the security for the resort where his prey was positioned. Alarmed, the Congress and JD (S) decided to fly them out to a friendly retreat in neighbouring Kerala. By evening, as the legislators assembled at the airport, permission was denied by the police deputy commissioner for the chartered flights. The next option was Hyderabad, which was any way closer by road from the Kempegowda airport.
Even as the time for swearing in was announced, the Congress sought an urgent hearing at the Supreme Court. A three-judge bench declined to stop the swearing-in and restrained the chief Minister from taking any executive action and ordered Yeddyurappa to produce the letters he had given to the Governor while staking a claim to form the government. It posted the hearing to the next day.
18 May
The battle of the ballot continued to remain in the Supreme Court, as both sides laid out their arguments. The court said it would want the vote to be taken the very next day. Former attorney general Mukul Rohatgi sought “a reasonable time, not one day, for a floor test” for him to prove his majority. The court replied: there are precedents fixing such short time period for a floor test. Rohatgi had one more reason to seek more time: “Congress and Janata Dal (S) lawmakers are locked up outside the state. They have to come. So give more time.”
One of the judges then said, “Better that the floor test is on Saturday so that nobody gets any time!” Yeddy’s request for a secret ballot was also denied.
In the evening, the Governor swore in as pro tem speaker K G Bopaiah, a legislator with a known past for his partisanship and loyalty to Yeddyurappa. The 62-year-old five-time lawmaker had once broken the rules to help Yeddyurappa. He disqualified 11 BJP lawmakers when they revolted in 2010 after Yeddy was charged in a mining scam. His move helped the Yeddy government survive a trust vote, but the Supreme Court cancelled the decision.
19 May 2018
The battle began early, with the Congress seeking the intervention of the Supreme Court. The same Bench, while declining to intervene and stop the pro tem speaker from conducting the floor test ordered that the vote would be shown live on local television. As the new members began to be sworn in, the Congress released a series of audio recordings and claimed that they were recordings of cash offers made by the BJP to its members. Yeddy resigned without taking the trust vote.
