JD(S) may try to lure Congress, BJP men

 

The party is likely to convene a meeting of leaders who have migrated to Congress and BJP soon after the ongoing session of legislature, sources said. 

The party made a similar bid in the past but in vain because of treatment meted out to former ministers including P.G.R. Sindhia and M.C. Nanaiah. Sindhia was sent into oblivion while Nanaiah too was humiliated and forced to quit a post offered by the state government.

 

Such setbacks notwithstanding, the leaders are not in a mood to give up their efforts. “Many leaders cannot go with the BJP because of its ideology. The Congress is full, so it cannot accommodate any more. So, we have a chance to revive the party by accommodating leaders from different communities. This can happen only if the leaders are assured of space and positions, perhaps bigger than that occupied by Kumaraswamy, in the party. Their supporters should be given tickets for Assembly elections, then such leaders will come back. Just for the sake of building a third force, no one will come to our party,” said a former minister adding that these leaders could be accommodated in the Legislative Council or Rajya Sabha.

 

Sources said a blueprint would be drawn up at the proposed meeting on how to go about this and who ought to be lured into the party fold in different districts. “There are many BJP and Congress leaders in various districts who have been sidelined. The party is likely to tap such leaders in the first leg,” sources added.