From Our Special Correspondent

Daijiworld Media Network

Bengaluru, Jan 19: A day after moving its 76 MLAs to a resort on the outskirts of the City, the Congress leader and former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Saturday issued show-cause notices to four MLAs - Ramesh Jarkiholi, B Nagendra, Umesh Jadhav and Mahesh Kumathahall–for abstaining from the State Legislature party meeting on Friday.

With opposition BJP planning to create disturbances in the constituencies of the ruling party MLAs for their spending time in resort, Siddaramaiah also advised the MLAs to return to their constituencies to prevent their absence from becoming a political issue.

Siddaramaiah

Siddaramaiah, in his notice to the four absentee MLAs, sought explanations as to why action of disqualification of their membership of the legislative assembly should not be taken against them.

KPCC president said Dinesh Gundu Rao said: ``We have no intention to take action against our MLAs. But we expect proper explanation from them for their non-attendance to the CLP meet.’’

Sources in the party said the former Chief Minister convened the CLP meeting on Saturday evening and discussed present political situation in the State, issues related to drought and budget proposals to be included in the 2019-20 budget and preparation for forthcoming parliamentary elections.

Dinesh Gundu Rao said AICC General Secretary in-charge of Karnataka, K C Venugopal, “will interact individually with each of MLAs regarding parliament elections and decision on future course of action taken.”

After discussions with Venugopal, the legislators are expected to leave the resort on Sunday evening.

Water Resources Minister D K Shivakumar, held a meeting and heard their grievances.

They were unhappy with the party leadership after the last month’s Cabinet reshuffle, sources said.

The opposition BJP, which attempted to exploit the discontent within the coalition government among the legislators of JD(S) and Congress, is believed to have shelved its plans to destabilize the government at this point. However, a section of BJP leadership is believed to be toying with the idea of bringing a no-confidence motion against the H D Kumaraswamy-led government and thereby prevail upon the dissident MLAs in the ruling combine to vote against the government.

It is, however, not clear whether the BJP will go ahead with the plans to move the no-trust motion in the assembly when it convenes for the budget session.

Meanwhile, more ministers, including newly inducted Housing Minister N Nagaraj (MTB) have expressed their willingness to give up their ministerial postings to accommodate dissident MLAs in the Cabinet.