BBMP power struggle: CM Siddaramaiah’s blessing for Operation Hasta?

Bengaluru: Unlike the popular perception that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah was not aware of the strategy behind ‘Operation Hand’, launched by a section of the Congress, aimed at wresting control of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagar Palike, the entire operation was blessed by Mr Siddaramaiah and those involved, who include Mr Munirathna Naidu, Mr Bhairati Basavaraju and Mr C.M. Ibrahim among others, sources say.

To ensure that the talks between the Janata Dal(Secular) and Congress reached a logical end, Mr Siddaramaiah roped in JD(S) MLA from Kadur, Y.S.V. Datta, who was close to him. The sources said Rattled by the BBMP results, Mr Siddaramaiah is determined to deprive the saffron party of taking control of the palike, and has decided, though hesitantly, to join hands with the JD(S).

The sources said that Mr Siddaramaiah intends to have the alliance with the JD(S) till the Bill on division of Bengaluru is approved by the President. “The President may take some time to give his consent. Once the bill is approved, he will sever ties with the JD(S) and dissolves the BBMP. Then he will divide the BBMP into five or six small corporations and announce elections,” they said.

Mr Siddaramaiah feels that the Bengalureans would forget this “political opportunism” once the city administration is brought back on track and the palike is made accountable and transparent, they said.

“The initial anger will die down. If we manage to give good governance, the people will then bless the Congress in the next elections,” the sources said.

JD(S) responds to Congress overtures

The JD(S), which was at loggerheads with the Congress for the last two years, has turned to the Congress to hit two birds with one stone. One, to teach a lesson to the “arrogant” BJP, and the other, to destroy the credibility of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, sources said.

The JD(S) had hoped to cross 20 seats in the BBMP and to play the role of a king-maker. Much to its disappointment, the party won only 14 seats and the BJP reached a comfortable 100-seat mark, dashing all its hopes. Rubbing salt over injury, BJP leaders did not even make a courtesy call to Mr Kumaraswamy, leaving him red faced.

The blessing in disguise came when the agitation over Kalasa-Banduri turned violent and the protesters attacked the houses of BJP state president Mr Pralhad Joshi and opposition leader Mr Jagadish Shettar. While Mr Joshi blamed the JD(S) for the attack, Mr Shettar went a step ahead and “revealed” that the JD(S), during the JD(S)-BJP coalition government, had opposed a cabinet proposal to release funds for the Kalasa-Banduri project.

The Congress, which has seen an opportunity, extended an olive branch to the JD(S) on Thursday morning, even though Mr Siddaramaiah and Mr Kumaraswamy are at loggerheads in the Assembly. After Mr Kumaraswamy agreed, Chamarajpet JD(S) MLA B.Z. Zameer Ahmed Khan was sent for negotiations. After one round of meeting with Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, Mr Khan, along with two more MLAs – Mr Gopalaiah and Mr Akhanda Srinivas Murthy – headed straight to the house of K.R. Puram Congress MLA Bairathi Basavaraj.

During the meeting, it was agreed that if the Congress could manage to rope in all the independent corproators, the JD(S) would throw its weight behind the Congress. It was also agreed that while Mr Khan would talk to Deve Gowda, Mr C.M. Ibrahim from the Congress would try to convince the JD(S) supremo. The late evening developments of Thursday were kept under the wraps, to shock the BJP on Friday morning.

Sources said that Mr Deve Gowda was more than willing to back the Congress, because the JD(S) wanted to prove before the world that Mr Siddaramaiah was power hungry and had no political morals. “It would destroy the credibility of Mr Siddaramaiah, which was what Mr Gowda wanted,” the sources said.

BJP caught off guard

Caught off guard by the Congress and Janata Dal (S) machinations to take control of the BBMP, the BJP leaders were left wondering on Friday whether they could really come to power in the Palike. The party is now regretting that it did not try to retain the three party rebel corporators who had gone to the BJP office on Wednesday evening.

“The three corporators were BJP workers, but they could not get tickets. They have won the election now. Former deputy chief minister R. Ashok, who was handling the BJP poll campaign, refused to meet them when they came to the party office. Now, the Congress-JD(S) team has spirited them away and kept them in some resort. In hindsight, it was a bad strategy on our part. Had we taken them back into the party on Wednesday evening, this situation would not have arisen," sources said.

The leaders also felt that the party levelled unnecessary charges against the JD(S) after the polls. “It was not necessary for our leaders to criticise the JD(S) for the Kalasa-Banduri agitation. It was a wrong strategy,” sources said. On Friday, the BJP tried to reach out to the JD(S), but to no avail.

Meanwhile, Mr Ashok, after holding a series of meetings, told reporters that the party has kept all options open. Union Law Minister D.V. Sadananda Gowda said that the party hopes to join hands with the JD(S). “JD(S) leaders know very well that in the last two years, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has caused a lot of damage to their party. We don’t think that they will go with the Congress,” he said.

The BJP was not sure whether the independent corporators had been taken away by the JD(S) or the Congress. One section felt that it was done by the JD(S) to use it as a bargaining chip with both the BJP and Congress, while the other group felt that it was the handiwork of the chief minister’s camp to finish off the BJP.

Mr D.U. Mallikarjun, who became an MLC with the help of both the BJP and JD(S), approached state JD(S) president H.D. Kumaraswamy to initiate talks on behalf of the BJP. “I tried to pacify the JD(S) leader, who is cut up with the BJP for alleging that he fuelled the agitation in Navalgund,” Mr Mallikarjun said in the evening.