Janata Dal(S) meeting defers selection of leader

Bangalore, May 27 (UNI) Still to recover from the severe drubbing it received at the hustings, the Janata Dal (Secular) today failed to elect its new leader in the Assembly.

A meeting of the new legislators held at the Party office here today deferred the election and cut short the "post-mortem" of its performance, party sources said.

The party could win only 28 of the 217 seats, it had contested this time. It had won 58 seats in the 2004 elections.

The meeting convened by Party national president H D Deve Gowda discussed at length the performance of the party in the recent elections. Among the newly elected legislators were former Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy and his brother and former minister H D Revanna.

The newly elected legislators briefed the Party leadership about the reasons due to which it faced debacle in the elections, the party sources said.

Mr Kumaraswamy was expected to be unanimously elected as the Legislative Party leader of JD(S), but it could not be done in today's meeting.

Mr Gowda told the MLAs to meet again and 'decide among themselves' who should be the new leader, the sources said.

The BJP, which fell short of gaining a majority on its own by winning 110 seats in the 224-member Assembly, has staked claim to form the government after securing the support of all the six Independents.

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