Bengaluru: If there is an award for the most sincere “disgruntled” MLA in the Congress, Basavanagowda Channabasavanagowda Patil would have won it on Friday.
BC Patil, the MLA from Hirekerur constituency in Haveri district of Karnataka drove straight to the Congress Legislature Party meeting from his daughter’s wedding venue in a decorated car.
He came, he signed and within an hour he left to the wedding reception venue.
“As an MLA I’ve come to the CLP meeting. I have come here despite my daughter’s wedding. My daughter’s reception is set to happen in the evening so I’m leaving now. Nobody has contacted me from BJP,” he told the media when leaving Vidhana Soudha where 76 out of 80 Congress MLAs marked their attendance.
On a usual day, the MLAs may have left for the wedding reception from the Vidhana Soudha. But their leaders had a different plan for them – all the MLAs were taken to the Eagleton resort outside Bengaluru immediately after the meeting.
His daughter Srushti Patil was married on Friday morning. Several political leaders including BS Yeddyurappa and HD Devegowda had attended the event.
Patil, an actor, a former cop, three-time MLA was an aspirant for a ministerial berth and had expressed his disappointment in public when the second round of cabinet expansion did not include his name. His daughter too had expressed a similar sentiment against the party.
Four such disgruntled MLAs, Ramesh Jarakiholi, Umesh Jadhav, Mahesh Kumtalli and B Nagendra, rebelled and remained absent for the meeting in spite of CLP leader issuing a whip. Two of them – Nagendra and Umesh gave court case hearing and illness as reasons for skipping the meeting. The four will be sent notices to explain the reason for their absence