Priyanka Gandhi leads in Wayanad, BJP ahead in Palakkad Assembly seat
Congress General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, who made her poll debut from Wayanad Lok Sabha constituency, was leading in the early trends on Saturday.
Amid allegations that the Bharatiya Janata Party is trying to poach lawmakers from the Congress and JD(S) to strengthen its position to form government, five Karnataka lawmakers (three from Congress and two from JD(S)) went incommunicado Wednesday causing panic for the latter two parties who are trying to stitch up an alliance.
According to media reports, while all the newly-elected Congress MLAs were called in for a meeting, the Congress couldn’t get in touch with three of its legislators — Rajshekhar Patil, B Nagendra and Anand Singh.
Also Read | Karnataka verdict: BJP poaching Congress MLAs, alleges DK Shivakumar
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JD(S) MLAs Raja Venkatappa Nayaka and Venkata Rao Nadagouda are also reported to be missing from the JD(S) legislative party meeting which is going on in a hotel in Bengaluru
The news comes a few hours after Congress alleged that the BJP had tried to poach some of its leaders. Some of the Congress MLAs were reportedly offered ministries in the new regime.
Apart from Congress, a JD(S) lawmaker also claimed that some of the MLAs from his party were approached by the BJP.
BJP, which emerged as the single largest party in the Karnataka Assembly polls, requires eight MLAs to cross the crucial mark of 112 seats to form the government.
Earlier, there were reports that BJP has offered the chief ministerial post to HD Kumaraswamy, son of JD(S) chief Deve Gowda, but the party later denied such reports.
Read More | Karnataka verdict: JD(S)-Congress or BJP? All eyes on Raj Bhavan
Congress, which won 78 seats, has declared its their unconditional support to JD(S) to form the government.
Despite falling short of the majority mark, the BJP has claimed that it is 100 per cent confident of forming government.
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