IndiaPost.com - Karnataka on the brink of mid-term polls

NEW DELHI: Karnataka is hurtling towards mid-term elections after coalition partners BJP and the JD(S) parted ways ending a 20-month-long bitter and uneasy relationship and both seeking people's mandate.

Smarting under former Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda's blunt message last night that power cannot be transferred to it, the BJP Parliamentary Board met this morning and decided to withdraw support to the Kumaraswamy government which the party ministers had quit last week.

The BJP called the JD(S) refusal as the "worst-ever betrayal" by a political party and said fresh elections were the only way out. Under an agreement the JD(S) was to hand over power to the BJP on October 3.

Hitting back, the JD(S) Parliamentary Affairs Committee accused the BJP of unleasing a "vicious campaign" against the party and particularly Chief Minister Kumaraswamy and his family.

Gowda charged BJP with indulging in a "vituperative smear campaign, unparelled in the history of coalition governments anywhere in the world and said the saffron party was "unnerved" by the growing popularity of the Chief Minister.

The JD(S) also ruled out any truck with the Congress to continue in power and favoured fresh elections. The Congress on its part dropped enough hints that it was not eager to do business with the Gowda-led party.

While AICC Media Department Chairperson M Veerappa Moily dubbed both the JD(S) and BJP as "power hawks and power hungry parties", the Congress Legislature Party failed to spell out its stand on the issue.