Karnataka Crisis: Supreme Court to hear Assembly Speaker Ramesh Kumar’s plea today

A bench headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi and comprising of justices Deepak Gupta and Aniruddha Bose, would take up Karnataka Speaker KR Ramesh Kumar’s plea today over his decision on the resignation of 10 rebel Congress and JDS MLAs.

Kumar had moved the top court against its order allowing the rebel Karnataka MLAs to submit their resignations to Assembly Speaker, saying that he can’t verify the resignations by the end of the day.

Meanwhile, former chief minister BS Yeddyurappa on Thursday said the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will wait for the Supreme Court (SC) order scheduled to be delivered today.

Speaking exclusively to News Nation, Yeddyurappa said, "10 MLAs have resigned so far but their resignation is not accepted, this is not right. All these MLAs have gone back to Mumbai. We will see what the Supreme Court will say tomorrow".

Yeddyurappa's statement comes barely moments after Speaker Kumar following his meeting with the dissident lawmakers denied to take any decision in haste, adding that he needs to examine these resignations all night and ascertain if they are genuine. Addressing a press conference, held at the Vidhana Soudha this evening, the Speaker further said, "The Supreme Court has asked me to take a decision. I have videographed everything and will send it tomorrow".

As many as 10 Karnataka rebel MLAs, who were camping in Mumbai, arrived in Bengaluru by two special flights on Thursday night, hours after the Supreme Court allowed them to meet the Assembly Speaker to convey their decision to resign. Even as the resignation of these Congress-JDS MLAs pushed the coalition government further to the brink, the BJP, with the strength of 105 members in the house, is eyeing to form the next government in Karnataka.

The coalition's strength in the 224-member Assembly stands at 118 (Congress-78, JDS - 37, BSP-1 and Independents-2), besides the Speaker. This includes MLAs who have resigned, as their resignations are yet to be accepted by the Speaker. The BJP has 105 MLAs in the House, where halfway mark is 113.