The strength of the Opposition dropped further in Karnataka with another Congress MLA joining the Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday. Narayan Swamy is the second Congress MLA after S Ramachandrappa to join the BJP.

With this development the strength of the opposition is down to 98 while the BJP has 109 in the legislative assembly where the magic number required as of now is 106.

The Congress has been protesting these developments and had even courted arrest on the issue. The BJP has however accursed the Opposition of trying to bribe their MLAs and cause instability to the state government.

Meanwhile, the BJP high command is yet to consider the plea of the rebel BJP MLAs who had said that they had only sought a change of the leader and had never indulged in anti-party activities. The high command is likely to await the verdict of the high court which has reserved orders on their disqualification plea.