Patel ready for trial of strength in Assembly

Addressing mediapersons after meeting the Council of Ministers here on Friday, Patel said though there are people trying to make political gain out of quoting numbers, “it won’t help anybody or any party”.

Even in the past, “we have destroyed ourselves with this,” he added. Asked about the 48 legislators owing allegiance to Deve Gowda who signed a memorandum demanding a change of leadership recently, he said, “Whether 48 or 420, we have seen the numbers game for the last so many years… and we have destroyed ourselves with this”.

Asked whether he expected the problem within the party to be resolved, he said, “Where is the problem?”. Dismissing the possibility of a splitin the party over the issue, he said everybody has realised what a split means. “We will go to the people unitedly and hopefully, the Janata Dal will do much better than other parties (at the polls),” he said.

When reminded of Deve Gowda’s statement, “The party can do without Patel”, he said, “Why should I bother about what someone or the other has said”.He also ruled out the possibility of a revolt in the party. On the demand for a change in leadership, he said he had not received even a “single chit” from the legislators asking him to step down. So far, the subjects discussed with him had “nothing to do with leadership, so why should I presume that?” he said.

At the Janata Dal Legislature Party (JDLP) meeting called on October 28, he said he would allow the legislators to discuss “people’s problems freely”.

Asked whether he would allow them to raise the subject of a change in leadership, he said, “I don’t know”. So far, they (the dissident legislators) have only referred to issues likefertiliser shortage, electricity and compensation for victims of rain havoc. All these subjects had been discussed at today’s council of ministers’ meeting, he said.