BS Yeddyurappa's Atal moment: An emotional speech & a dramatic resignation

By resigning before going in for a trust vote, 75-year-old BS Yeddyurappa did what his party's tallest leader and former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee did in 1996 when, after heading the government at the Centre for 13 days, he stepped down for want of the numbers. Both leaders delivered an emotional speech before resigning — Vajpayee in the Lok Sabha and Yeddyurappa in the Assembly.

On May 28, 1996, Vajpayee resigned as prime ministers before the confidence motion could be put to vote as the BJP failed to muster the numbers.

Interestingly, Vajpayee's struggle was against HD Deve Gowda, who was nominated as the prime ministerial candidate by the Janata Dal-Congress-Left combine, an alliance formed to keep the BJP at bay.

Twenty-two years later, Yeddyurappa is pitted against Deve Gowda's son HD Kumaraswamy, the chief ministerial candidate of the Congress-JD(U) combine, formed to prevent the BJP from coming to power in the southern state.

Concluding his speech in the Assembly on Saturday, Yeddyurappa said: "I come from a background of struggle. I will lose nothing if I lose power... I am going straight to Governor's house to give my resignation."

In the 1996 general elections, the BJP had emerged as the single largest party with 161 Lok Sabha seats and then President Shankar Dayal Sharma had invited Vajpayee to form the government and he was sworn in as the 10th Prime Minister of India. But the BJP failed to garner enough support from other parties to obtain a majority and Vajpayee resigned after 13 days.

He submitted his resignation to the President after delivering a stirring speech in Parliament. After a fiery debate on the motion of confidence that lasted for two days, Vajpayee's reply, loaded with wry wit, sarcasm and passion, lasted some 75 minutes.

When the Speaker, P A Sangma, was preparing to put the motion to vote, Vajpayee shocked the House by ending his speech, saying: "You want to run the country. It's a very good thing. Our congratulations are with you. We will be completely involved in the service of our country. We bow down to the strength of majority. We assure you that till the time the work that we started with our bare hands in national interest is not completed, we shall not rest.

Respected speaker, I am going to the President to tender my resignation."