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Bangalore, 29 July 2011: In return for relinquishing the Karnataka chief ministership, BS Yeddyurappa is bargaining with his party, the BJP. He has asked the party to make him the state president of the BJP and Shohba Karandlaje as his successor. 

BJP leaders Arun Jaitley and Rajnath Singh are in Bangalore to oversee the election of a new legislative party leader. 

Yeddyurappa’s demands have been reportedly conveyed to BJP troubleshooter Dharmendra Pradhan after Yeddyurappa’s breakfast meeting with his supporters at his residence. 

"Yeddyurappa’s proposed candidate should become chief minister and Yeddyurappa should be the party president. This is our demand," BP Harish, MLA and a close associate of Yeddyurappa said. 

The demands have been made to the party at a time when it is in the process of zeroing in on a new chief minister for Karnataka. Meanwhile, MP DB Chandre Gowda has urged the party to reconsider the decision of asking Yeddyurappa to step down. 

Pradhan has reportedly conveyed this message to the party bosses and has asked to pick an alternative leader before the situation could turn alarming. 

Besides being a first time MLA, party sources said Shobha is not acceptable to everyone in the party. State BJP president KS Eshwarappa, former party president DV Sadananda Gowda, general secretary Ananth Kumar, rural development and panchayat raj (RDPR) minister Jagadish Shettar, law and urban development minister S Suresh Kumar and higher education minister VS Acharya are top contenders for the post. 

After putting up a fight for over 24 hours, Yeddyurappa finally agreed to resign as chief minister of Karnataka. However, his condition is that he would put his papers only after July 31 noon. An astrology follower, Yeddyurappa believes that the timing of resignation would affect his career prospects. His astrologers had advised him to resign after the end of the month of Ashada, which is after July 30. 

The buying of time is seen as a ploy by Yeddyurappa’s camp to split the party by moblize more members in his favour in the next three days. 

Buoyed by the presence of large number of legislators at his residence on Thursday evening, Yeddyurappa at present is holding breakfast meeting with his supporters.