Bengalur : The fate of Congress-JD(S) coalition government hangs in a delicate balance as 14 MLAs, including eight from Congress and three from JDS, on Saturday submitted their resignation letters to the Karnataka Assembly Speaker KR Ramesh Kumar in the Vidhan Soudha in Bengaluru.

Speaker KR Ramesh Kumar instructed his office to take resignations and give acknowledgement that 11 MLAs have resigned.

“14 MLAs have resigned against the Government till now, We also met the Governor. We wrote to speaker to accept our resignation. Coalition Government did not meet the expectations of the people of Karnataka,” JD(S) MLA H Vishwanath said.

He also denied that the legislators have resigned voluntarily and were not influenced by “Operation Kamala”.

Later in the day, rebel Congress-JD(S) MLAs, who had submitted their resignations to the Speaker, met Governor Vajubhai Vala at the Raj Bhavan in Bengaluru.

With today’s resignations, the number of the Congress and the JD(S) MLAs have reduced to 69 and 34, respectively. The Congress-JDS coalition tally will reduce to 103 seats but more significantly the overall strength of the House will now fall to 211.

The Karnataka Legislative Assembly has 225 chairs and the magic figure is 113. In the current assembly which has a total strength of 211, the coalition has 103 MLAs — Congress (65 MLAs), JD(S) (35 MLAs), BSP (one MLA), Karnataka Pragnyavantha Janatha Party (one MLA) and one independent. The BJP has 105 MLAs.

BJP leader and Union Minister DV Sadananda Gowda said that Karnataka BJP chief B S Yeddyurappa will be the Chief Minister if a new Government is formed in the state. On being asked if BJP will form government in Karnataka, Union Minister DV Sadananda Gowda said, “Governor is the supreme authority, as per the constitutional mandate if he calls us, certainly we are ready to form the government. We are the single largest party, we have got 105 people with us.”

In a political slugfest, Yeddyurappa alleged that Congress leader DK Shivakumar tore the resignation letters of some of the MLAs when he met them at the Speaker’s office. “People are watching the way DK Shivakumar is behaving. He tore resignation letters of some of the MLAs inside the Speaker’s office, who had gone to resign, it is condemnable,” the Karnataka BJP chief was quoted as saying by news agency ANI.

The following Congress MLAs tendered their resignation to the Speaker today: Ramalinga Reddy (BTM Layout), BC Patil (Hirekerur), Pratapgouda Patil (Maski), Shivaram Hebbar (Yellapur), Mahesh Kumathalli (Athani), ST Somashekhar (Yeshwanthpur), Byrati Basavaraj (KR Puram) and Soumya Reddy (Jayanagar).

Following JD(S) MLAs reportedly submitted their resignation letters to the Speaker today: H Vishwanath (Hunsur), Narayan Gowda (Krishnarajpet) and K Gopalaiah (Mahalakshmi Layout).

Congress MLA and former state home minister Ramalinga Reddy was the first to confirm that he has submitted his resignation letter to the Speaker. “I am not going to blame anyone in the party or the high command. I somewhere feel I was being neglected over some issues. That is why I have taken this decision,” Reddy said.

The Congress swung into action immediately with state minister DK Shivakumar reaching out to the disgruntled MLAs. Karnataka Minister and Congress leader DK Shivakumar held meeting with rebel Congress MLAs Ramalinga Reddy, ST Somashekar and Byrathi Basavaraj at his official residence. Earlier, he met rebel Congress MLAs at Karnataka Assembly and said, “Nobody will resign, I had come to meet them.”.

Meanwhile, Congress has convened an emergency meeting its Bengaluru MLAs and Corporators to discuss the crisis. The meeting will be chaired by Deputy Chief Minister G Parameshwara and Shivakumar.

Karnataka Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy is currently in the USA on an official visit. He is expected to return to Bengaluru from the United States on Sunday. Karnataka Congress President Dinesh Gundu Rao is in United Kingdom and is likely arrive in Bengaluru tomorrow.