BJP to take final decision on Yeddyurappa Wednesday (Roundup)

NEW DELHI/BANGALORE - The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Tuesday night said it will take a final decision Wednesday morning on the fate of beleaguered Karnataka Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa, who is facing allegations of favouring his close relatives with prime land.

“The entire gamut was discussed and a decision will be taken by tomorrow,” senior BJP leader M. Venkaiah Naidu said after a three-and-half hour meeting held late Tuesday night at the residence of party president Nitin Gadkari here.

The meeting was attended by Yeddyurappa and senior leader Arun Jaitley among others.

A tired-looking Yeddyurappa said after the meeting he was a sincere worker of the party and will abide by its decision.

“I have worked hard to build the party. There is no question of not obeying the party’s decision,” the chief minister told reporters.

Earlier, a series of meetings were held to decide the fate of the Karantaka chief minister.

“We will make our position clear on all issues in Karnataka. Everything will be announced Wednesday,” BJP spokesperson Tarun Vijay told reporters here.

Vijay repeated the party’s allegations that the Congress was pressing for Yeddyurappa’s removal “to divert attention from the raging 2G spectrum allotment scam and other corruption issues”.

The BJP announcement in Delhi came even as the Lokayukta in Karnataka criticised the way the chief minister handled the allegations regarding the land allotment.

Naidu said the party leaders were still studying documents given by Yeddyurappa on land deals during the previous Congress and Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) rule. “We will take a decision and Yeddyurappa will abide by it,” Naidu added.

Gadkari has been authorised by senior party leaders to take a final call on whether to allow Yeddyurappa to continue or ask him to quit.

The chief minister has ordered a probe into land scams since 1995, but the JD-S, which has been releasing documents alleging illegal land deals by him, said in Bangalore that it will boycott the enquiry.

JD-S leader H.D. Revanna, son of former prime minister and JD-S chief H.D. Deve Gowda, said “the probe cannot bring out the truth”.

The probe “will not serve any purpose and the JD-S will boycott it,” he told reporters.

Yeddyurappa announced Monday that retired Karnataka High Court judge B. Padmaraj will enquire into residential plot allotment by the Bangalore Development Authority and ‘denotification’ of land by the Karnataka Industrial Area Development Board and other agencies since 1995 to the present day.

Meanwhile, Lingayat community leaders in the Congress Tuesday criticised the heads of the Lingayat community mutts (religious institutions) for coming out in support of Yeddyurappa as chief minister.

“It is a disgrace for the entire Lingayat community if religious institutions’ heads start indulging in politics to defend a corrupt chief minister and other politicians on the basis of community,” they told a press conference in Bangalore.

The press meet was addressed by M.P. Prakash, a former minister, Veeranna Mattikatti, former chairman of the legislative council, Rani Satish, former head of state Congress women’s cell, and legislator Amaregowda Bayyapura.

Yeddyurappa is a Lingayat and a frequent visitor to these mutts as well as various temples.