The Supreme Court had in its Thursday morning order rejected Yeddyurappa’s plea, made through senior counsel Mukul Rohatgi, asking for at least a week’s time to face the floor test, and directed it to instead be conducted today.
A bench of justice A K Sikri, justice S A Bobde and justice Ashok Bhushan yesterday said the pro-tem Speaker, conventionally the senior-most member of the assembly, would administer the newly-elected members their oath and then conduct the floor test.
The court junked attorney general K K Venugopal’s suggestion that the floor test be conducted through secret ballot.
The court also barred Yeddyurappa from taking any policy decisions till the floor test.
Following the apex court order, Yeddyurappa told reporters in Bengaluru that he was confident of proving his majority in the House. “We welcome the Supreme Court order of floor test at 4pm today. We are confident of proving our majority,” he said.
Union Human Resource Development Minister Prakash Javadekar, who was election in-charge of the BJP in Karnataka, also expressed similar confidence.
On the other hand,, Congress President Rahul Gandhi said the BJP’s “bluff” has been called.
“The BJP’s bluff that it will form the government, even without the numbers, has been called by the court. Stopped legally, they will now try money and muscle, to steal the mandate,” he tweeted.
Yesterday evening, the confrontation between the two sides once again reached the Supreme Court, with the Congress claiming that the appointment of BJP legislator K G Bopaiah as pro-tem Speaker by the governor “violates every single constitutional norm” of senior-most member being appointed to the post.
Advocate Dev Dutt Kamat, who filed the application for the Congress and the JD-S, told reporters at the Supreme Court that the application was filed at 7.45pm and has been listed to be heard by a bench of justice A K Sikri, justice S A Bobde and justice Ashok Bhushan at 10.30am today.
The Congress contended that Bopaiah is not the senior-most member in the newly-elected House. The party alleged Bopaiah’s appointment was made “with the sole intent of manufacturing a majority out of minority for Yeddyurappa”.
Meanwhile ahead of the crucial floor test in the Karnataka Assembly, former chief minister Siddaramaiah was yesterday elected as the Congress legislature party leader in Hyderabad, the party said.
“The party unanimously passed a resolution to elect Siddaramaiah as the Congress legislature party leader,” the statement said.
The Congress legislature party meeting was held at a star hotel in the Deccan city where its newly-elected lawmakers stayed after reaching earlier in the day from Bengaluru in chartered buses.
The Congress and the Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) had shifted their newly-elected legislators to Hyderabad late Thursday to prevent the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from poaching them for defection.
The legislators will be returning to Bengaluru before 11am today, when the new assembly will be convened to enable them to take oath.
