“Operation Kamala”: sixteen resignations bring down Karnataka's coalition

The Congress and JD(S) had formed a post-poll coalition government after the 2018 Karnataka Assembly election, with JD(S) leader H. D. Kumaraswamy as Chief Minister — a combination that held a majority on paper but was, from the start, an uneasy alliance between two parties that had fought each other for the same voters.

In July 2019, sixteen Congress and JD(S) MLAs resigned in a wave — two on 1 July, twelve more within days — leaving the coalition without a majority. Critics dubbed the pattern “Operation Kamala” (kamala, “lotus,” being the BJP's election symbol), alleging the BJP had engineered the resignations with inducements; the BJP denied orchestrating them.

Kumaraswamy's government fell, and B. S. Yediyurappa was sworn in as Chief Minister on 26 July 2019 — his fourth term — heading a BJP government that went on to win most of the resulting by-elections in the vacated seats.