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“There is no question of change (of Chief Minister D V Sadananda Gowda),” Gadkari told reporters after addressing ministers, legislators and MPs at a meeting at a resort on Bengaluru’s outskirts.
He, however, tried to placate the sulking Yeddyurappa: “Yeddyurappa is the popular face of our party in Karnataka.”
Gadkari said: “The Lokayukta (ombudsman) report is an injustice to Yeddyurappa. He has challenged it. I am confident he will get justice. He will be given an honourable position then.”
Yeddyurappa quit last July 31 after the then Lokayukta N Santosh Hegde recommended his trial for corruption in the illegal mining scam.
Gowda, who took over as chief minister on August 4, was Yeddyurappa’s choice. However, the two have fallen out allegedly because Gowda is trying to emerge from Yeddyurappa’s shadow.
Yeddyurappa’s supporters say he will announce his plan of action on February 27, his 70th birthday.
Earlier this week, Dharwad-based NGO Samaj Parivartan Samudaya (SPS) had revealed documentary evidence of Yeddyurappa and his kin receiving kickbacks from mining firms for granting leases.
The SPS, which submitted 113-page documents to the Supreme Court-appointed central empowered committee (CEC), claimed two real estate firms owned by Yeddyurappa’s family members received Rs6crore in return for granting a 330-acre mining lease to R Praveen Chandra of Chitradurga in October 2010.
The power struggle in the state unit forced the BJP to cut short its two-day brainstorming session to teach morality and discipline to its ministers and legislators.
The two-day ‘chintan-manthan’ was called following the involvement of three ministers - Laxman Savadi, C C Patil and J Krishna Palemar - in porn viewing in the assembly on February 7. The three quit the cabinet the next day.
However the meeting was cut short by a day. The reason given for ending the session yesterday itself was that Gadkari had to go back to Uttar Pradesh for the election campaign.
The party was aware that campaigning in that state had peaked when it announced the chintan-manthan. But it failed to anticipate the possibility of its first chief minister Yeddyurappa, smarting after he was forced to quit, seizing the opportunity of Gadkari’s visit to press for his reinstatement or for a top position in the state unit.
With Yeddyurappa and his supporters indicating they will walk out of the ‘chintan-manthan’ after Gadkari’s address, the party said the meet will be a one-day affair.
It turned out to be half-day affair as the meet was called off after Gadkari left for Delhi soon after his address.
Yeddyurappa remained grim-faced at the meet as Gadkari rejected his demand at a meeting the two had at a hotel in the city centre ahead of the chintan-manthan session.
Meanwhile the Congress party yesterday claimed that the people of Karnataka were suffering because of the infighting in the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party. Spokesperson Rajiv Shukla told reporters in New Delhi that while he would not comment on BJP’s internal affairs, the people of Karnataka “are paying for the internal conflicts of the party in the state”.
No crisis in Karnataka, claims Jaitley
Denying reports of a standoff between the Bharatiya Janata Party and former Karnataka chief minister B S Yeddyurappa, senior party leader Arun Jaitley said there was no political crisis in the state. “There is no crisis in the party in Karnataka,” Jaitley said in New Delhi. “There is no problem that he has created... what you are attributing to him is not the factual situation,” Jaitley said denying any standoff between the former chief minister and the party. Yeddyurappa is reported to have set a February 27 deadline for the party’s central leaders to decide on his demand for reinstatement or to be officially declared the supreme leader of the party in the state.. Yeddyurappa, the BJP’s first chief minister in southern India, quit July 31 last year over corruption charges. The BJP came to power for the first time in Karnataka in May 2008. Assembly polls are due early next year.