Yeddyurappa quits without taking floor-test
Bengaluru, May 19: Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa resigned on Saturday before facing a crucial trust vote in the Karnataka Assembly with numbers stacked against the BJP in the newly elected House, bringing an end to a political thriller that began after May 12 elections threw up a hung verdict.
In an emotional speech in the Assembly, Yeddyurappa said the BJP didn't get the numbers needed to prove majority in the House.
"I will lose nothing if I lose power, my life is for the people," he said.
In his 15-minute speech, the 75-year-old BJP leader said there was no way he could have served the people of Karnataka as the Congress was not even allowing its MLAs to speak to their family members.
"If only people would have given us 113 seats instead of 104, we would have made this state a paradise. But I will fight for the state till my last breath. We will get 28 out of 28 seats in Lok Sabha and I will win 150 Assembly seats for Narendra Modi (in the next Assembly elections)," Yeddyurappa said.
Asserting that the mandate showed that the state's people have rejected the Congress and the Janata Dal-Secular (JD-S), he said: "People have voted against the Congress' misgovernance. I have faced many 'agni pareeksha' (trial by fire) in the past and this trust vote is just another one."
He then he would resign as the Chief Minister of Karnataka and after the speech, drove to the Raj Bhavan to submit his resignation to Governor Vajubhai Vala.
The resignation comes two days after he took oath as the 23rd Chief Minister of the state.
The May 12 election across the state in 222 constituencies of the 225-member assembly, including one nominated, threw up a hung House, with no party securing majority. Polls in two constituencies were deferred.
Of the 222 seats, the BJP won 104, the Congress 78, the Janata Dal-Secular, 37 and one each was bagged by the Bahujan Samaj Party, the Karnataka Pragnyavantha Janatha Party and an Independent.
As JD-S leader H.D. Kumaraswamy won from both Channapatna and Ramanagara segments, the party's effective strength in the House was 36.
As the single largest party, the BJP was short of crossing the halfway mark.
Yeddyurappa required the 111 halfway mark to win the motion or one more than the half of the members present at the time of the floor test was conducted in the House with an effective strength of 221.
Though the Governor had directed Yeddyurappa to seek a vote of confidence on the floor of the House within 15 days from the date of assumption of office as the Chief Minister (May 17), a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court ordered the floor test on Saturday, rejecting his plea for a week's time to prove his majority.
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US SC rejects 26/11 attack accused Tahawwur Rana’s plea seeking stay on his extradition to India
New York, Apr 7 (PTI): The US Supreme Court has rejected 26/11 Mumbai terror attack accused Tahawwur Rana's appeal seeking a stay on his extradition to India, moving him closer to being handed over to Indian authorities to face justice.
Rana, 64, a Canadian national of Pakistani origin, is currently lodged at a metropolitan detention centre in Los Angeles.
He is known to be associated with Pakistani-American terrorist David Coleman Headley, one of the main conspirators of the 26/11 attacks. Headley conducted a recce of Mumbai before the attacks by posing as an employee of Rana’s immigration consultancy.
Rana had submitted an ‘Emergency Application For Stay Pending Litigation of Petition For Writ of Habeas Corpus' on February 27, 2025, with Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and Circuit Justice for the Ninth Circuit Elena Kagan.
Kagan had denied the application earlier last month.
Rana had then renewed his ‘Emergency Application for Stay Pending Litigation of Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus previously addressed to Justice Kagan’, and requested that the renewed application be directed to US Chief Justice John Roberts.
An order on the Supreme Court website noted that Rana's renewed application had been “distributed for Conference” on April 4 and the “application” has been “referred to the Court.”
A notice on the Supreme Court website Monday said that “Application denied by the Court.”
Rana was convicted in the US of one count of conspiracy to provide material support to the terrorist plot in Denmark and one count of providing material support to Pakistan-based terrorist organisation Lashker-e-Taiba which was responsible for the attacks in Mumbai.
New York-based Indian-American attorney Ravi Batra had told PTI that Rana had made his application to the Supreme Court to prevent extradition, which Justice Kagan denied on March 6. The application was then submitted before Roberts, “who has shared it with the Court to conference so as to harness the entire Court’s view.”
The Supreme Court justices are Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, Associate Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr., Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Associate Justice Elena Kagan, Associate Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, Associate Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett, and Associate Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.
In his emergency application, Rana had sought a stay of his extradition and surrender to India pending litigation (including exhaustion of all appeals) on the merits of his February 13.
In that petition, Rana argued that his extradition to India violates US law and the UN Convention Against Torture "because there are substantial grounds for believing that, if extradited to India, the petitioner will be in danger of being subjected to torture."
"The likelihood of torture in this case is even higher though as petitioner faces acute risk as a Muslim of Pakistani origin charged in the Mumbai attacks,” the application said.
The application also said that his “severe medical conditions” render extradition to Indian detention facilities a “de facto" death sentence in this case.
The US Supreme Court denied Rana's petition for a writ of certiorari relating to his original habeas petition on January 21. The application notes that on that same day, newly-confirmed Secretary of State Marco Rubio had met with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar.
When Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrived in Washington on February 12 to meet with Trump, Rana’s counsel received a letter from the Department of State, stating that “on February 11, 2025, the Secretary of State decided to authorise” Rana’s "surrender to India,” pursuant to the “Extradition Treaty between the United States and India”.
Rana’s Counsel requested from the State Department the complete administrative record on which Secretary Rubio based his decision to authorize Rana’s surrender to India.
The Counsel also requested immediate information of any commitment the United States has obtained from India with respect to Rana’s treatment. “The government declined to provide any information in response to these requests,” the application said.
It added that given Rana’s underlying health conditions and the State Department’s findings regarding the treatment of prisoners, it is very likely “Rana will not survive long enough to be tried in India".
During a joint press conference with Prime Minister Modi in the White House in February, President Donald Trump announced that his administration has approved the extradition of "very evil" Rana, wanted by Indian law enforcement agencies for his role in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks, "to face justice in India”.
A total of 166 people, including six Americans, were killed in the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks in which 10 Pakistani terrorists laid a more than 60-hour siege, attacking and killing people at iconic and vital locations in Mumbai.
