By IANS
Bangalore : A twice-postponed meeting of the coordination committee of Karnataka’s ruling Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) coalition was cancelled soon before it was to be held Saturday, widening further the rift between the two parties.
The meeting was to start at 8 a.m. But at 7.45 a.m., when BJP leaders were about to leave for the venue, the chief minister’s secretariat sent a fax informing them about the cancellation of the meet, Deputy Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa of BJP told reporters.
The last-minute cancellation evoked sharp reaction from BJP, with state unit president D.V. Sadananda Gowda telling Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy of JD-S that meetings of the coordination committee were not a child’s play.
The coordination committee was to meet Thursday to sort out the growing differences over transfer of power from JD-S to BJP in October. It was postponed to Friday, and then to Saturday.
On Thursday, BJP cabinet ministers made Kumaraswamy wait for nearly an hour to hold a cabinet meeting as they were upset with his statement that a section in his party was feeling that the association with BJP was affecting the secular image of JD-S.
This was seen by BJP as a ploy to deny it the chief minister’s post on Oct 3 as per an understanding the two parties reached in February 2006 when they came together to form the coalition government.
Sadananda Gowda and Yediyurappa told reporters that “the coordination committee had its own importance and dignity and its meetings should not be treated in a cavalier manner”.
Gowda said no reason was mentioned in the fax for the cancellation of the meeting. “The meeting should be held at the earliest,” he added.
With less than 40 days to go for Kumaraswamy to make way for Yediyurappa, he and several JD-S ministers and leaders have been making contradictory statements over power transfer, creating doubts in BJP that it will be deprived of the chance to have its first chief minister in southern India.
Angry over Kumaraswamy’s statement in Gulbarga district Wednesday that association with BJP was affecting JD-S’ secular image, the BJP was reportedly ready to tell him at the coordination committee to either commit himself to power transfer or go in for elections.
Kumaraswamy justified the last-minute cancellation of the meeting. He told reporters in Bellary that the postponement was necessitated as he and other JD-S members of the committee had already scheduled their visits to various places for Saturday.