Deve Gowda Expels C.M. Ibrahim, Who Opposed Alliance with BJP, as JD(S) Karnataka President

New Delhi: The Janata Dal (Secular) [JD(S)] on Thursday, October 19, expelled C.M. Ibrahim, who had opposed the party’s alliance with the BJP, as the Karnataka state president. The party’s national president H.D. Deve Gowda also dissolved the state unit and appointed his son H.D. Kumaraswamy as the ad-hoc president.

Gowda’s order came after Ibrahim revolted against the party’s decision to join the NDA. He held a meeting with ‘like-minded’ people in JD(S) on Monday to announce the formation of a core committee to submit a memorandum that the JD(S) should not join hands with the BJP and that his faction was the “original one”.

Speaking to reporters on Thursday, Kumaraswamy said, “To strengthen the party, our national president today took the decision to dissolve the old unit and announced the ad-hoc committee in my leadership… Naturally, it will be communicated to him (CM Ibrahim)…My responsibility is to strengthen the party…My concentration is to develop my party.”

Ibrahim said on Monday, “If Deve Gowda and Kumaraswamy have decided to go with the BJP then let them go… We are asking them (Gowda and Kumaraswamy) not to go. If they go then we cannot bind them. Regarding (JD-S) MLAs, please wait and see who, how many, and where these MLAs will take a decision. We will intimate you when the time comes.”

Kumaraswamy claimed on Thursday that the party’s 19 MLAs in Karnataka were with him and his father. Outside of Karnataka, JD(S) has a marginal presence in Kerala and Maharashtra.

On Tuesday, Ibrahim told The Print that Kumaraswamy made the decision to join the NDA and Deve Gowda accepted it under “pressure”. The other party leaders were not asked about the decision, he said.

“JD(S) MLAs do not want to align with the BJP… Either they want to remain independent or they want to go with INDIA (the alliance of opposition parties led by the Congress). That has been the opinion… If there is no secular stand, then Muslims will not stay. Not just minorities, even Vokkaligas won’t stay with the party,” he told.