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Journalism of Courage
IN A sign of unhappiness over the recent alliance of the JD(S) with the BJP, its Karnataka president C M Ibrahim said Saturday that he had not been kept in the loop on the tie-up. The JD(S) leader added that he would be assessing his options at a meeting with well-wishers on October 16.
The former Union minister, who joined the JD(S) from the Congress last year, is the most well-known Muslim leader in the party.
Asserting that he was hurt at party chief H D Deve Gowda and son H D Kumaraswamy keeping him in the dark over the alliance with the BJP, Ibrahim claimed that Congress leaders as well as other INDIA partners such as Sharad Pawar of the NCP and Nitish Kumar of the JD(U) were in touch with him.
“Deve Gowda is like a father and Kumaraswamy is my brother. I have affection for them. But what has hurt me is that I am the party president and you have gone to Delhi without saying a word to me. You have not told me about the discussions,” Ibrahim said. “You had said the core committee will travel across the state, gather opinion and then a decision will be taken. Before the core committee could start its tour, you went to Delhi and met (BJP leaders).”
Earlier, smaller Muslim leaders in the JD(S) had expressed apprehensions over the alliance with the BJP, with some indicating their intent to leave the party. On September 24, a section of them held a meeting at Bengaluru under working president and former minister M N Nabi. After the meeting, Nabi said they would hold another meeting in Bengaluru and announce their decision.
JD(S) vice-president Shafiullah Baig, among those to have already quit the party, said: “Not only minority leaders, all leaders who follow secular principles are unhappy about the decision.”
The Union Civil Aviation Minister during Deve Gowda’s short tenure as the Prime Minister of a United Front government, Ibrahim had quit the JD(S) in 2008 to join the Congress, and was instrumental in facilitating, shortly after, the switch of Siddaramaiah from the JD(S) to the Congress.
In April 2022, Ibrahim left the Congress after the party high command ignored him while picking the state Legislative Council leader. He was welcomed into the JD(S) with much pomp, and was immediately made the party’s Karnataka president, with the responsibility of instilling new vigour in the JD(S) ahead of the 2023 Assembly polls.
In a barb at the Congress, he had said at the time: “My high command is now accessible to me right here in Bengaluru. I can talk to my leader Deve Gowda any time I want, or to Kumaraswamy whenever I want. There is no need to wait endlessly and rely on others to meet my party leadership.”
However, Ibrahim has been grumbling within the JD(U) too, often complaining of being relegated to the role of “a corner deity” in the party.
