All's well that ends well is how the Karnataka Assembly session, where Chief Minister Kumaraswamy proved his majority, can be best described.
True, the Bharatiya Janata Party, with 79 legislators, and the Janata Dal-Secular, with 41 MLAs, make for strange bed fellows, but it looks like Kumaraswamy will last the course, despite murmurs about how long his government will last.
His maiden statements in the House showed that he had turned into a matured politician.
His promise to the Chair that he was ready to order any kind of investigation into the land scams in the state itself was a pointer to this.
He was sober and attentive and never looked uninterested till the late hours of a very long session.
Though there were doubts if Kumaraswamy can steer a state seen to be heading towards very high levels of development, those who watched Kumaraswamy in the House on Wednesday feel he is far better than his predecessor Dharam Singh.
Political observers say that there was nothing wrong in the 'new unholy partnership' (as the Congress and other opposition parties claimed on Wednesday in the House).
"The state is back on the track of progress. It seems the new coalition will pave the way for new political equations," one observer said.
There were initial doubts about whether Kumaraswamy can hold on to his supporters. But he emulated his father in handling situations and in keeping the house in order. Even a few JD-S ministers from the Dharam Singh government are with Kumaraswamy now.
Others feel that the fear some of the legislators had about a mid-term poll was the real reason for the kind of support Kumaraswamy has got from unforeseen quarters.
An impending mid-term election might have been against the interest of the legislators, who are facing the ire of the voters in their respective constituencies for their failure.
The recent Taluk and Zilla Panchayat election results had shown how the Congress and former Deputy Chief Minister Siddaramaih held sway among the voters.
The BJP also was a gainer.
Perhaps, if JD-S had continued in the Dharam Singh government, it would have self-destructed. So saving one's head was everyone's priority and the legislators have achieved it, at least for the time being.
