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Updated: Jul 14, 2019 14:12 IST

Former Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah has called for a meeting of the Congress legislature party at 9 am on Monday at a luxury hotel in Bengaluru where the MLAs are staying, the party said in a statement on Sunday.

Fifty Congress MLAs are believed to be staying at the Taj Vivanta in Bengaluru. Siddaramaiah is the leader of the Congress legislature party. His call came after a minister, MTB Nagaraj who on Saturday said that he would not quit the Congress, left for Mumbai on a chartered flight this morning. The other rebels have refused to move out of Mumbai.

Nagaraj, who had submitted his resignation last week, seemed to have softened his stand on Saturday after DK Shivakumar, the Congress’ key troubleshooter in Karnataka, reached out to him. Nagaraj told reporters that he was reconsidering his resignation and would also try to convince another MLA - K Sudhakar - to withdraw his resignation as well.

Despite chief minister H D Kumaraswamy insisting that he is ready for a trust vote the coalition government is facing its biggest crisis with 16 MLAs -- 13 of the Congress and three of the JD(S) -- resigning their assembly membership. Two independent legislators, who were made ministers recently to provide stability, have quit the cabinet and are now backing the opposition BJP.

The ruling coalition’s strength in the 224-member House is 116 (Congress 78, JD(S) 37 and BSP one), besides the Speaker. The BJP has 105 MLAs and is backed by two independent MLAs.

Also read: Karnataka crisis: Five more MLAs move SC over rejection of resignations

The coalition’s tally could fall to 100 if the resignations of the 16 MLAs are accepted.

Karnataka’s BJP president BS Yeddyurappa who is angling to wrest the chief ministership said efforts by the ruling coalition partners would not yield any result and has predicted that the government was about to fall.