H D Kumaraswamy to Congress: You can trust us

“I want to make it clear that we are giving unconditional support to the Congress, to save and to develop the city,” Mr. H.D. Kumaraswamy said.

In a move that also set to rest reports that intermediaries and not the leaders of the two parties were hammering out the ‘deal,’ Mr Kumaraswamy said that he had personally spoken to the KPCC president Dr. G. Parameshwar and that, when his party MLA Zameer Ahmed Khan met Chief Minister, Siddaramaiah on Sunday, the former handed over his phone to Mr Siddaramaiah and the two leaders spoke on the phone.

“I noticed a statement of Mr Siddaramaiah made in Mysuru that he was not involved in the entire affair. However, Mr Siddaramaiah while speaking to me, clarified that he had been misquoted,” he said. He said he did not want to be blamed for any developments in the future saying “I am now coming before you to put the record straight, so that in future, no one should blame us.”

He was referring to the reputation for “back-stabbing” and “blackmailing” allies that his party had acquired when the Congress-JD(S) alliance broke in 2006 and JD(S)-BJP alliance ended in acrimony over a pre-agreed handover of power in 2007, which the JD(S) stands accused of not honouring.

He said his party was used by national parties whenever they needed power in the past and was later abused, in an oblique reference to unconfirmed reports that the JD(S) was deeply upset at a rebuff by senior BJP leaders in the state after the recent BBMP polls.