A teary-eyed B.S. Yediyurappa “voluntarily” stepped down as Karnataka chief minister on Monday, announcing his decision at an event to mark his two years in office and ending several days of suspense.
The 78-year-old, four-time chief minister, who had won his current term by engineering defections and toppling the Congress-JDS government in 2019, said he had decided to quit on his own with no message coming from the BJP leadership.
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“I have decided to go to the Raj Bhavan after lunch and submit my resignation — not out of sadness but in all happiness,” an emotional Yediyurappa said at the end of a 20-minute address, his voice choking as he recalled how he had helped turn the BJP into a political power in Karnataka.