8 Nov : The BJP on Sunday bought peace with the party rebels in Karnataka demanding the removal of B S Yeddyruppa who will continue as chief minister while a coordination committee will oversee its affairs in the state.
A compromise between the warring sides to break the two-week-long stalemate is understood to have been hammered out under which a woman minister may be removed and the Speaker inducted into the Cabinet.
Announcing the “amicable” settlement as a birthday gift to senior BJP leader L K Advani, who turned 83 on Sunday, party leader Sushma Swaraj said in the presence of Yeddyruppa and dissident leader G Janardhana Reddy that there are no more “misunderstandings”.
Swaraj is tipped to head the seven-member Committee that will include the chief minister, senior leader Anant Kumar, state unit president Sadananda Gowda and G Karunakara Reddy, brother of Janardhana Reddy.
Under the compromise formula, the Chief Minister may sack his favourite minister Shoba Karandlaje and induct Speaker Jagadish Shettar into the Cabinet.
However, the Chief Minister denied that there was any formula for ending the crisis.
Both Yeddyruppa, who has been in New Delhi for the last five days, and Reddy concurred with her.
The Chief Minister said with the help of national leadership including Advani and party President Rajnath Singh the problems have been resolved and “we will not allow such a problem to arise again”.
Janardhana Reddy, who had refused to meet the chief minister, said “we all will work together for the betterment of the state”.
The Reddy brothers are considered close to Swaraj, who had contested from Bellary Lok Sabha polls against Congress President Sonia Gandhi in 1999.
He said “she (Swaraj) will be taking care of the family and has given a well planned decision in the end”.
A solution to the week-long crisis was hammered out at a meeting attended by Yeddyruppa and dissident ministers Janardhana Reddy and Sriramulu at the residence of Swaraj.
“The crisis which was there for about last seven days in Karnataka has been resolved amicably”, Swaraj told reporters.
This was for the first time that Reddy, who refused to meet the Chief Minister after the crisis erupted, came face to face with Yeddyruppa to find a solution to the issue.
Swaraj said that the problem occurred at a time when the leaders should have been in the state to work for providing relief to the people affected by the floods.
They would work together and everything would be compensated, she said.The chief minister said that whatever happened in the last 15 days was a history.