Reacting to the power shift in the state post the trust vote, Rahul Gandhi took to Twitter and said: "From its first day, the Congress-JDS alliance in Karnataka was a target for vested interests, both within and outside, who saw the alliance as a threat and an obstacle in their path to power. Their greed won today. Democracy, honesty and the people of Karnataka lost."
The Congress party alleged the Bharatiya Janata Party of political horse-trading and blamed it for the subversion of the Congress-JDS coalition government.
AICC General Secretary In-charge of Karnataka, K.C.Venugopal said in his statement: “The subversion of coalition government in Karnataka carried out by the BJP is one of the most heinous political horse tradings the country has ever witnessed.”
The coalition government was subverted by the nefarious joint efforts of the Central Government, Governor, State Government of Maharashtra and BJP leadership. BJP facilitated this dirty-dealing political drama by offering a huge amount of black money and ministerial berths to the defected MLAs, he said.
“Along with this, the BJP also misused central agencies like enforcement and Income Tax for black mailing and horse trading. BJP has carried out one of the biggest political subversion and hawala transaction to destabilize the coalition government in Karnataka”, Venugopal added
As CM Kumaraswamy tendered his resignation to Governor Vajubhai Vala, former Karnataka CM and senior Congress leader Siddaramaiah said that the rebel MLAs are liable of disqualification.
“I would like to reaffirm that those who have fallen for Operation Kamala will never be inducted back to our party. Even if the sky is falling down!!” he said in a tweet.
“15-16 of our MLAs violated the whip by abstaining from the House during trust vote, thereby, it is a clear violation of Schedule 10 (of the Constitution) and attracts disqualification,” he was quoted as saying by news agency ANI.
Congress leader HK Patil said: “Congress-JD(S) failed trust vote. This defeat is because of betrayal of our party legislators, we have come under the influence of various things. I am people of Karnataka will not tolerate this type of betrayal to the Party.”
KC Venugopal said that Congress party will hold nationwide protests against the “immoral political destabilization” carried out by the BJP.