oppn parties Congress To Blame For Crisis In Karnataka Alliance

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  • Supreme Court questions the continuing relevance of two-child norms. The Court observed that falling fertility rates have weakened the population-control rationale behind laws disqualifying people with more than two children from contesting local body elections. It referred the issue to a larger Bench for consideration
  • Supreme Court declines to shift Tirupati laddu case outside Andhra Pradesh. The Court rejected a plea seeking transfer of the trial, despite arguments that political statements by Andhra Pradesh's Chief Minister and Deputy Chief Minister could affect the fairness of proceedings
  • Supreme Court transfers Azam Khan's fresh ED bail plea to Allahabad High Court. The apex court declined to consider the Samajwadi Party leader's bail request in a fresh Enforcement Directorate case and directed that it be listed before a division Bench of the High Court on November 16
  • Two killed in Delhi building collapse; contractor booked. Two bodies were recovered after a building collapsed in Chawri Bazaar. Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta said the contractor had been booked and the concerned junior and assistant engineers suspended
  • Uttar Pradesh voter rolls show a 2.4-crore discrepancy. A difference of approximately 2.4 crore names has been reported between the state's panchayat and rural Assembly voter lists. The Election Commission has ordered the two sets of rolls to be matched
  • Gujarat announces 3% dearness allowance hike. The state government announced a three-percentage-point increase in dearness allowance for government employees and pensioners ahead of Diwali
  • Sensex and Nifty post their strongest single-day gains in months. The Sensex surged 2,008.61 points, or 2.60%, to close at 79,310.01, while the Nifty 50 climbed 576 points, or 2.40%, to 24,536.60. Financial and automobile stocks led the rally, supported by falling crude prices and renewed foreign investor buying
  • Maaya Rajeshwaran reaches WTA-level quarter-final. The 17-year-old Indian defeated Poland's Weronika Falkowska 6-4, 6-3, becoming the first Indian woman since Sania Mirza in 2012 to reach a quarter-final at a WTA Tour-level singles event
  • Tanvi Patri reaches Youth Olympics badminton final. The 15-year-old defeated Japan's Yuzuno Watanabe in the semi-final, assuring India of a medal and becoming the first Indian badminton player to reach the girls' singles final at the Youth Olympics
  • India beat Pakistan 3-2 in SAFF Championship. India defeated Pakistan in a closely contested match, having led 3-0 before conceding two late goals. The victory was reported as a significant result for India's second-string side
  • India beat Japan 4-1 to win a record sixth Asian Champions Trophy. India recovered from an early deficit to defeat Japan in the final at Mohali, extending its record as the tournament's most successful men's team
  • The Supreme Court issued notice to the Centre and the Election Commission on a petition challenging Section 16 of the Chief Election Commissioner and Other Election Commissioners Act, 2023, which grants the CEC and Election Commissioners protection from legal proceedings for acts performed in their official duties. The petition argues that such blanket immunity could leave citizens without an effective remedy for alleged wrongdoing by the Commission
  • The Supreme Court told voters whose names were deleted from Delhi's draft electoral rolls not to be apprehensive about seeking re-enrolment through Form 6, after the Election Commission assured it that such applicants would not be prosecuted merely because their names had appeared in earlier rolls
  • Congress leader Rahul Gandhi opened the party's campaign for the 2027 Punjab Assembly elections with an Insaaf rally in Sangrur, Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann's home district, accusing the AAP government of failing to control drugs, gangster violence and corruption. Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge outlined six commitments, including a drug-free Punjab, protection of farmers, employment for young people and action against corruption
  • Rahul Gandhi accused the AAP government of running Punjab through a remote control from Delhi and questioned Bhagwant Mann's ability to tackle drug abuse, making personal allegations about the Chief Minister's conduct during their time together in Parliament
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Congress To Blame For Crisis In Karnataka Alliance

By Sunil Garodia

About the Author

Sunil Garodia Editor-in-Chief of indiacommentary.com. Current Affairs analyst and political commentator. Author of Cyber Scams in India, Digital Arrest, The Money Trap and The Human Hack

With the resignation of 11 MLAs, the Congress-JD(S) government is facing a fresh crisis. This time, however, the numbers, combined with two Congress MLAs who had resigned some days ago, threaten to topple the government. More seriously, as the Congress has continuously chosen to brush the discontent in the party under the carpet, senior leaders like Ramalinga Reddy (a name to reckon with in Bangalore) and H Viswanath have been forced to put in their papers. Some of the resigning MLAs have indicated that they want former CM Siddaramaiah back in the hot seat.

It is surprising that instead of acknowledging the crisis, people like DK Sivakumar and KM Narayanswamy have sought to underplay the issue. Sivakumar first said that nobody had resigned but later said that those who have wished to resign have small grievances and the party will address them to bring them back in the fold. Narayanswamy, on the other hand, chose to blame the media for blowing up the issue as according to him only 4 or 5 MLAs had resigned.

A clue that a break-up in the alliance was imminent was available when former PM and JD(S) patriarch HD Deve Gowda had recently said that mid-term polls were inevitable. That he chose to retract his statement under pressure from the Congress did nothing to quell the buzz. Deve Gowda is too seasoned a politician to indulge in loose talk. He must have sensed the mood in the Congress camp where several MLAs, instigated by Siddaramaiah, were bent on breaking the alliance. His reading of the matter was correct and the Congress has indeed broken up.

The fault lies with the Congress. It has kept its eyes and ears closed even as a large number of its MLAs have resented giving the top seat permanently to the JD(S) which won just 37 seats. Some state Congress leaders, especially Siddaramaiah and his supporters, have spent all their time trying to undermine HD Kumaraswamy and the very government they are a part of. The Congress should have renegotiated the terms of the alliance with the JD(S) to seek rotation of the top job and better representation for its MLAs as per its status of the party with more than double the seats. By not doing so, it has allowed the discontent to fester and the BJP an opportunity to stake the claim to form the government.