Minutes after B.S. Yediurappa won the trust vote of his government on Monday, Karnataka Assembly Speaker K.R. Ramesh Kumar resigned from his post.
Kumar bowed before the Assembly after the conclusion of the trust vote and submitted his resignation to deputy speaker Krishna Reddy. Kumar is a Congress member and a six-time MLA from the Srinivaspur Assembly seat.
Kumar had been in the headlines since the political crisis surrounding the Congress-JD(S) government began on July 1. A total of 16 Congress and JD(S) legislators submitted their resignations from the Assembly to Kumar, reducing the Congress-JD(S) government to a minority. Kumar was accused by the rebel MLAs and BJP of delaying acceptance of the resignations and threatening them with disqualification. A total of 15 rebel MLAs petitioned the Supreme Court against perceived inaction by Kumar.
The Supreme Court on July 17 ruled that the rebel MLAs would be shielded from any action for missing House proceedings, but also noted the speaker was empowered to decide the nature of action against them. Since the collapse of the H.D. Kumaraswamy government a week ago, Kumar disqualified a total of 17 MLAs, including one independent legislator who switched support to the BJP. This would prevent the legislators from standing for elections till the end of the current Assembly's tenure.
