In silver lining to Congress-JDS govt, rebel MLA Nagaraj decides to withdraw resignation

Bengaluru: In a silver lining to the crisis-hit coalition government of Congress and Janata Dal (Secular) in Karnataka, rebel MLA MTB Nagaraj on Saturday confirmed that he will withdraw his resignation. Nataraj announced his decision to the media after a meeting with Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy and Congress leader Siddaramaiah at the latter's Bengaluru residence.

The marathon meeting, which lasted for about five hours, concluded with Congress convincing Nataraj to retract his resignation from the Karnataka Legislative Assembly. Nataraj said that he will withdraw the resignation on Sunday. He also said that he will try to convince fellow rebel MLA Dr Sudhakar Rao to withdraw his resignation.

“Sudhakar (Rao) and I had given our resignation from the MLAs post. Since morning, all the leaders have been asking me to stay in Congress. I have decided to stay in the party,” news agency ANI quoted him as saying. “We will try to convince Sudhakar as well and both of us will take our resignation back,” the MLA from Hoskote said.

Earlier in the day, Nagaraj had hinted at the possibility of reconsidering his decision after Congress leader DK Shivkumar met him for four hours at his residence and convinced him to remain in the party.

This comes a day after Kumaraswamy refused to resign as chief minister and declared that he was ready to seek a trust vote to prove his majority on the floor of the house. He also asked the Speaker to fix a time, in an effort to save the Congress-JD(S) coalition government in the state.

After Kumaraswamy's statement in the assembly, Congress, BJP and JD(S) arranged to move their lawmakers to resorts to prevent 'poaching' attempts.

BJP chief in Karnataka BS Yeddyurappa had expressed confidence on facing a no-confidence motion in the assembly on July 15.

The Congress-JDS coalition government in Karnataka hit a political crisis after 16 of its MLAs belonging to both parties submitted their resignations to the state Assembly Speaker Ramesh Kumar, to join rival BJP.

However, the resignations were not accepted by the Speaker on the grounds of incorrect format. A total of 15 rebel MLAs have moves the Supreme Court against the speaker for not accepting their resignations.

If the resignations are accepted, the coalition's 118 members will go down to 100 and the majority mark will go from 113 to 105. The BJP has 105 members and with the support of the two Independent MLAs, its tally will go to 107.