Chennai: BJP Karnataka president B S Yeddyurappa is to be sworn in Chief Minister of the State at 6 pm today.
After the Tuesday evening floor test, the Kumaraswamy government lost the confidence vote by 95-105 in a House with an effective strength of 205 members.
This led to speculation that the BJP might try to form the government. There was hectic discussions yesterday with BJP president Amit Shah.
This morning, Yeddyurappa met Governor Vajubhai Vala, and staked claim to form the government. With the Governor inviting him to form the government, reports say that Yeddyurappa is to be sworn in Chief Minister this evening at 6.
This would be the fourth time that Yeddyurappa is becoming the Chief Minister of Karnataka.
Speaking to reporters in Bengaluru earlier, he said, “As I’m already the Leader of the Opposition, there is no need to call legislature party meeting.”
Yeddyurappa for the last couple of days had been waiting for “instructions” from the party high command to stake claim to form the government after the Congress-JD(S) coalition government had collapsed following the floor test on Tuesday.
A group of Karnataka BJP leaders, including Jagdish Shettar, Arvind Limbavali, J C Madhuswamy, Basavaraj Bommai and Yeddyurappa’s son Vijayendra yesterday met party chief Amit Shah in New Delhi and reportedly discussed the government formation.
Karnataka Assembly Speaker K R Ramesh Kumar had yesterday disqualified three rebel Congress MLAs under the anti-defection law. The 14-month-old Congress-JD(S) coalition government headed by H D Kumaraswamy collapsed Tuesday after losing the vote of confidence in the Assembly in a climax to the three-week-long intense power struggle.