Embarrassed by two of its MLAs S.T. Somashekhar and Shivaram Hebbar violating the party whip in Rajya Sabha polls, the BJP has decided to submit a letter to Speaker U. T. Khader seeking their disqualification from the Assembly membership.
While Mr. Somashekhar cross-voted in favour of the Congress candidate, Mr. Hebbar abstained from voting in the Rajya Sabha polls in which the BJP-JD(S) alliance’s second candidate Kupendra Reddy was defeated.
Leader of the Opposition R. Ashok told mediapersons after the declaration of results that the BJP State unit would also report the matter to the party high command seeking its intervention in acting against the erring MLAs.
Mr. Ashok described the action of both the MLAs as “cheating the party”, while pointing out that the party had even made them Ministers in the previous dispensation.
‘Political suicide’
“We had issued party whip to them and even informed them through WhatsApp,” he said. He described the action of Mr. Somashekhar indulging in cross-voting as “political suicide” and expressed confidence that people of his constituency would teach a lesson to him.
Soon after it became clear that Mr. Somashekhar had indulged in cross voting in Rajya Sabha polls, the party workers staged a protest in Yeshwanthpur Assembly constituency represented by him.
The BJP workers burnt an effigy of the MLA. The protesters displayed placards demanding that Mr. Somashekhar get out of the BJP. Meanwhile, the JD(S) workers too protested against Mr. Somashekhar in front of their party head office in Bengaluru.
