DK Shivakumar: Man who saved Congress MLAs from 'horse-trading' in Karnataka

D K Shivakumar is the man responsible for holding together the Congress MLAs while BJP allegedly tried all its power for horse-trading their MLAs.

Congress leader DK Shivakumar (R) with JDS leader HD Kumaraswamy. PTI

New Delhi: The U-turn of the hectic political developments around Karnataka assembly elections has been quite a watch. The BJP lost power in Karnataka as Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa resigned on Saturday before the trust vote, as he did not have the numbers to prove his majority. His resignation paved the way for formation of a Congress-Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S) government headed by H. D. Kumaraswamy. While the BJP was allegedly in full force to engineer defections in both JD(S) and Congress, a Congress MLA was busy shielding his party members. D K Shivakumar is the man responsible for holding together the Congress MLAs while BJP allegedly tried all its power for horse-trading their MLAs. DK Shivakumar is being hailed as the saviour of Congress in Karnataka. It was Shivakumar who saved Vilasrao Deshmukh’s government in Maharashtra from collapsing by keeping the 40 Congress MLAs under his supervision in Bengaluru’s Eagleton resort. One of the richest MLAs of Karnataka has 730 crores of declared assets. He contested his first election in 1989 at the age of 29. Since the initial phase of his political career, Shivakumar’s fight has been against HD Deve Gowda and his son Kumaraswamy. His is said to be a crucial role in the defeat of HD Deve Gowda in 2004 elections. He was also the mastermind behind defeating Kumaraswamy in 1998.