NEW DELHI, July 5: Foemer prime minister H D Deve Gowda might be delighted to find Bihar Chief Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav in a sorry plight but he has a lot to be concerned about his own support base in Karnataka where a sizeable section of the Janata Dal has turned against him.The crisis in the Janata Dal has clearly exposed Gowda's fast-losing grip on the party in Karnataka, even if pro-Laloo Yadav MPs from the State chose to keep away from the convention where the split was formalised today.Nearly one-fourth of the national council members from the State boycotted the polling for party president held on Thursday and many others, including a handful of ministers in the J H Patel government, voted at the last minute under threat from the CM.Of the 15 Lok Sabha members from Karnataka, at least six including Union Textiles Minister R L Jalappa, are Laloo Yadav's sympathisers. Human Resource Development Minister S R Bommai, a Rajya Sabha member, has also fallen out with Gowda.It is not that this section of the party has any great love for Laloo. It is a mixture of their antipathy to Gowda who they describe as some kind of a ``feudal overlord,'' gratitude towards Laloo and naked opportunism that has made them go over to the rival camp.Jalappa has seldom enjoyed a great equation with Gowda. Bommai has fallen out with him for his autocratic ways.It was Laloo who got a Lok Sabha ticket for this former IPS officer when Gowda tried to scuttle it. For MPs like Qamarul Islam who incidentally was brought to the Dal by Gowda's Man Friday, C M Ibrahim, just before the 1996 general polls, it is a case of the lure of ministerial office. And there is at least one MP whose loyalties lie with Ramakrishna Hegde who has vowed to get back at Gowda.There are quite a few heavyweights at the State level who have turned against Gowda. Deputy Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, not long ago was Gowda's blue-eyed boy. Transport Minister P G R Sindhia is the other one. They are recent additions to the anti-Gowda faction comprising mostly of Hegde acolytes.
