BS Yeddyurappa to meet Governor Vajubhai, wants to take oath as chief minister at 12:30 pm

Karnataka BJP chief BS Yeddyurappa will meet Governor Vajubhai Rudabhai Vala today to stake claim to form the government in the state. According to sources, he will ask the Governor to organise the oath-taking ceremony at around 12:30 pm today. 

"I am going to meet the Governor today at 10 am to stake claim to form the government and I will request him to hold oath ceremony today itself," Yeddyurappa told media persons. 

The development comes a day after senior Karnataka leaders met party chief Amit Shah and working president JP Nadda in the national capital.

The BJP leaders from Karnataka discussed the political situation in the state. They included Jagadish Shettar, Basavraj Bommai and Arvind Limbavali, sources said.

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The 14-month-old Congress-JDS government lost the trust vote by 105-99 in the House on Tuesday after three weeks of intense power struggle in the state.

According to sources, the party leadership was waiting for Speaker KR Ramesh to decide on resignations of rebel MLAs to avoid any future embarrassment.

The Speaker has disqualified one Independent and two Congress rebel MLAs as Assembly member till end of term in 2023. Those disqualified Karnataka legislators include Independent MLA R Shankar, Congress MLAs Ramesh Jharkiholi and Mahesh Kumathalli.

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On Wednesday, Karnataka BJP chief B.S. Yeddyurappa said he was awaiting instructions from the central party leadership on staking claim to form an alternative government.

Shankar is one of the two Independent MLAs who withdrew support to the Kumaraswamy government and switched sides ahead of trust vote held in Vidhana Soudha on Tuesday. Jarkiholi and Kumathalli too submitted their resignations in early July, pushing the 14-month old wobbly Congress-JDS government to the brink of collapse. The decision to disqualify the Karnataka legislators has been announced by the Speaker during a media briefing over the status of the rebel MLAs in the politically unstabled state.

All three cannot contest elections till the 15th state assembly is dissolved, the Speaker said, dashing hopes of ministerial berths under a BJP government that most of them were promised. "I have rejected the resignations... the way they have come - it compelled me to arrive at the inference that resignations were not voluntary and genuine," Kumar said.