Bengaluru: Bharatiya Janata Party Legislature Party meeting here today morning elected party’s chief ministerial candidate B S Yeddyurappa as its leader. The meeting went on for just 10 minutes. It had a single point agenda of electing the leader. The party leaders after this meeting met Governor Vajubhai Vala and staked claim to form the next government in Karnataka as single largest party.

BJP has 104 MLAs after Assembly election was held for 222 seats on May 12 but still fell short of 7 seats to form the Government. One KPJP MLA Shankar was seen with BJP leaders at Raj Bhavan. It is believed that BJP tally is at present at 105.

Yeddyurappa along with party-in charges Prakash Javdekar, P Muralidhar Rao and others submitted the list of 104 legislators to the Governor. He said the party would be able to form the government with the support from outside and requested the Governor to invite him to form the new government.

After counting was taken up yesterday, BJP had emerged as the single largest party with 104 members, followed by Congress 78 and Janata Dal (S) 38 and two independents.

Speaking before the BJPLP meeting Union Minister Anant Kumar said that BJP had emerged as the single largest party while Congress had been rejected by the people and Janata Dal (S) emerging a distant third behind BJP.The party expects that it was invited to form the government first as it had the people’s mandate.

Yesterday leaders of all the major three political parties had met the Governor to stake claim to form the government. Congress had offered unconditional support to JD(S) to form the new government.

Siddaramaiah’s comments against PM baseless, unfounded and malicious: Prasad

New Delhi: Terming as ‘baseless’, ‘unfounded’ and ‘malicious’ the comments made against Prime Minister Narendra Modi by outgoing Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, Union Minister for Law and Justice and Communication and Information Technology Ravi Shankar Prasad on Wednesday said the Congress leader should understand the mandate given by the people.

Addressing a press conference to brief the media about the decisions taken by the Union Cabinet, Mr Prasad said, ‘I have seen the comments made by Mr Siddaramaiah in which he has made unfounded and baseless charges against our popular Prime Minister. We strongly condemn it. I completely deny the allegations made by him against the PM.

The country has watched and heard the address by the PM on Tuesday. He had expressed gratitude towards the people of Karnataka and expressed his commitment for the development of the state. The PM did not say anything to warrant such charges,’ Mr Prasad said.
While declining to make any comment on the process of government formation in the state, leaving it to the discretion of the Governor, Mr Prasad, however, made an observation on the Congress and the Janata Dal-Secular deciding to stake claim to form a government in the state.
‘It is the prerogative of any party to take a decision. However, the election in Karnataka has been held after five years. They should understand the nature of the people’s mandate.

The Chief Minister contested elections from two seats, of which he lost from one seat by 35,000 votes while on the other seat he won by just 1,700 votes. Further, 16 of his cabinet ministers have lost the elections,’ Mr Prasad pointed out.
Karnataka’s outgoing Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Wednesday accused the Prime Minister of encouraging horse-trading to bring the BJP to power in the state.

Talking to reporters after a meeting of the Congress Legislature Party, he said, ‘Narendra Modi is encouraging horse-trading.’
The Congress on Tuesday announced its decision to extend support to the JD-S for formation of a government in the state.