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Will Sonia and Deve Gowda meet?

Special Correspondent

Stock-taking exercise on Karnataka in Hyderabad

NEW DELHI : The Congress central leadership will firm up its response to the situation facing its coalition government in Karnataka following a split in the Janata Dal (Secular) after gauging first hand the mood of its State leaders.

This stock-taking exercise will be undertaken over the next couple of days in Hyderabad, where the entire leadership of the party will converge for the 82nd plenary.

Meeting convened

Though Congress president Sonia Gandhi convened a meeting of her close aides on Friday — the second in as many days on Karnataka — party sources said a course of action would be decided after deliberations with the State leadership and legislators in Hyderabad.

Friday's meeting was attended by Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Home Minister Shivraj Patil, and All-India Congress Committee in-charge of Karnataka A. K. Antony.

Holding on to a sliver of hope of salvaging the situation, there were indications of a possible meeting between Ms. Gandhi and JD(S) president H. D. Deve Gowda before January 27 — the day fixed by Karnataka Governor T. N. Chaturvedi for a floor test in the Assembly.

BJP denies hand in split

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) maintained that it had not engineered the split in the JD(S).

Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the National Council here, senior leader M. Venkaiah Naidu said the BJP decided to stake claim only after the breakaway JD(S) group led by H. D. Kumaraswamy approached it with a formal proposal.

Also, he underscored the fact that it was the JD(S) and not the BJP which had served an ultimatum to the Government.

JD(S) divided

The JD(S) had been divided over the issue of aligning with the BJP since the 2004 Assembly elections, Mr. Naidu said.

The mandate of the last poll was against the Congress.

The BJP emerged as the single largest party and at that time itself "we tried to give an alternative government to the State but were unable to do so because of differences within the JD(S) over working with us."

Arguing that the general opinion in Karnataka was that a mid-term poll was inevitable, he said the BJP was only trying to avoid such a situation.

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