Ahead of the upcoming Lok Sabha 2024 polls, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Janata Dal (Secular) have sealed an alliance in Karnataka, BJP leader and former chief minister BS Yediyurappa confirmed on Friday. The agreement has been for four seats, Yediyurappa said adding that Union Home Minister Amit Shah agreed to give four Lok Sabha seats to JD(S).BJP, JD(S) join hands ahead of Lok Sabha pollsRecently, JD(S) chief HD Deve Gowda met BJP national president JP Nadda and Amit Shah and held a meeting to work on the alliance, but only the details were pending.Notably, the Gowda-led party came into alliance with Congress and formed the government with HD Kumaraswamy as the chief minister. However, the government was ousted after it lost the trust vote in 2019, a year after it came to power.According to the reports, JD(S) wanted to contest from Mandya, Hassan, Tumakuru, Chickballapur and Bengaluru Rural. BJP agreed to let it contest on four seats — Kolar, Hassan, Mandya and Bengaluru rural.Deve Gowda on INDIAs meetingThis move comes days after the JD(S) supremo claimed that his party was neither with opposition-led India nor with the NDA. Deve Gowda said that they would fight the 2024 Lok Sabha elections independently.Once an ally with Congress, JD(S) was not invited to the INDIA meeting held in Bengaluru last month. Speaking on which, Deve said, “Some (Karnataka) Congress leaders did not want me… Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar is my good friend (but) since Congress doesnt want me… I skipped.”On Wednesday, a meeting was held at the residence of Deve Gowda to seek the opinion of the party workers on the prospective alliance. Most leaders have given their opinion in favour of an alliance with the BJP.
