Karnataka Congress, JD(S) MLAs Lodged In City Hotels

Hyderabad has unexpectedly become the destination for the Congress-JD(S) combine to protect its MLAs from being poached by the BJP on the eve of the floor test in the Karnataka Assembly scheduled for Saturday in which the state's political fate is expected to be decided.

While the Karnataka Governor had given CM B S Yeddyurappa 15 days to prove his majority, the Supreme Court today ruled that the floor test of the MLAs should take place by 4 pm on Saturday (tomorrow) itself. The BJP is being suspected of trying its best to poach MLAs from the Congress and JD(S) camps to meet the 112 mark (it has 104 MLAs), and if that is true, the new 24-hour deadline would obviously have made the party far more aggressive, and that makes Hyderabad suddenly the most important city in the country.

The Congress and JD(S) were originally trying to keep their flock together by hosting them in a resort on the outskirts of Benguluru, but the sudden withdrawal of police protection at the resort by Yeddyurappa as soon as he was sworn in as CM made the Congress and JD(S) leaders decide to take the MLAs out of Karnataka itself. In the beginning all arrangements were made to shift the Congress and JD(S) legislators to Cochin in chartered flights, but that had to be cancelled following refusal of permission for the flights to take off.

Responding to an appeal made then by JD(S) chief H D Kumaraswamy, the Chief Ministerial aspirant, both AP Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu and Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao came forward to host the MLAs and give them the required protection. Thus the Congress and JD(S) legislators were herded in special buses to Hyderabad yesterday. While some reached here late last night, others arrived in the early hours today.

The Congress MLAs are lodged in Taj Krishna at Banjara Hills, and the JD(S) MLAs in Novotel Hotel in Hitec City.

The police have made strict and tight security arrangements at both the hotels to ensure that there is no easy access to the legislators. Every person entering either hotel is being thoroughly checked before being allowed inside. Even the media is being blocked from the places. The officials and hotel staff are also quite tight-lipped about the number of legislators lodged in the star hotels.

Telangana Congress leaders including TPCC President Uttam Kumar Reddy, Leader of Opposition in the Legislative Council Shabbir Ali and many senior Congress leaders received the MLAs and ensured that the requisite facilities were provided to them.