The Hindu : Karnataka / Bangalore News : It is all up to Deve Gowda

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jan 27, 2006

Karnataka

Karnataka - Bangalore

It is all up to Deve Gowda

A. Jayaram

Former Prime Minister still calls the shots

Bangalore: The most important turnabout in the past three days of the political happenings in the State is that it is former Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda who has the whip hand and not his son, H.D. Kumaraswamy.

No longer is Mr. Deve Gowda putting on the pretence that his son took on himself the task of destabilising the Government.

The Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress are looking to Mr. Deve Gowda to sink the Government or sail with it.

Besides the Government being on trial, what is also on trial is the plighted word.

Naidu's comments

So far the BJP and sections of the Congress have gone by the words of Mr. Kumaraswamy and Mr. Deve Gowda, respectively. Even this morning BJP leader M. Venkaiah Naidu said: "We believe in Mr. Kumaraswamy and have confidence in him." With only one day left for deciding the fate of the Congress-Janata Dal (Secular) Government, both the Congress and the BJP are at the courtesy of Mr. Deve Gowda.

If a majority of the Janata Dal (S) MLAs go with Mr. Kumaraswamy, who has sworn to form a government with the BJP, it is the end of Mr. Deve Gowda's hold over the party which he floated in July 1999 after breaking the united Janata Dal.

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