Karnataka: Unprincipled Politics

President’s rule has been declared in Karnataka following the breakdown of the alliance between the Janata Dal (Secular) (JD(S)) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The coalition government had been formed on the basis of a powersharing arrangement that envisaged handing over the reins of the chief minister’s post from the JD(S) to the BJP after 20 months in office. This arrangement also involved an elaborate division of ministries among both the parties. The JD(S), breaking the covenant, refused to hand over the post of chief minister to the BJP, whose nominee, deputy chief minister B S Yediyurappa was supposed to replace the current incumbent from the JD(S), H D Kumaraswamy, chief minister since January 2006.

This display of breach of trust has been widely berated, for the reasons offered by the JD(S) for their actions amount to nothing. The sudden discovery by the JD(S) of the communal character of the BJP (even as no such classification was made in the first place during the formation of the coalition) will not convince anyone. Simply put, this action by the JD(S) is reflective of its mean and small-minded politics.