The BJP will form the government in Karnataka come what may, state revenue minister R. Ashoka has said, explaining that the party would activate “Plan B” if it does not win enough votes.

“We guarantee that we will form the next government. Don’t ask how,” said Ashoka, the BJP’s Vokkaliga face who is contesting from two seats, including Kanakapura where he is pitted against Congress powerhouse D.K. Shivakumar.

“Our Plan A is absolute majority. In Plan B, our leaders from Delhi will discuss with our state leaders (about) what to do,” the minister told the News 1st Kannada television channel during a panel discussion on Thursday.

While Ashoka did not spell out what “Plan B” was, the BJP has in the past been accused of engineering defections in rival parties using money and muscle power.

The BJP had not won a majority in Karnataka during the last elections in 2018, but came to power a year later when 17 ruling alliance MLAs defected, toppling the JDS-Congress government.

A video clip purportedly showing Ashoka talking about “Plan B” on another platform, too, was circulating on social media on Friday.

“It’s the Parliament election in another year. We have kept even that in mind. Keeping in mind the Parliament election we are getting ready with the belief that we will get an absolute majority (in the state polls),” the minister appears to be saying in what seems a television interview.

It is not clear which channel the interview was on.

“In case we don’t (win), we naturally have a B formula. We are a political party. We are not saints. We have a Plan B,” Ashoka purportedly says.

Chief minister Basavaraj Bommai pleaded ignorance about a “Plan B”, saying: “I don’t know. I haven’t spoken to him.”

Calls to Ashoka did not go through. The BJP, Congress and the Janata Dal Secular are working out the various possible permutations and combinations in the event of a hung Assembly emerging on Saturday.

The high turnout of 73.1 per cent, against the previous highest of 72.13 per cent recorded in 2018, has raised the hopes of a clear mandate. But if neither the Congress nor the BJP gets a majority in the 224-member Assembly, the JDS could play kingmaker.

State JDS president C.M. Ibrahim said: “Many of them (leaders of rival parties) are in touch with us. Let us wait and see.”

Ibrahim, a former Union civil aviation minister who last year returned to the JDS after being sidelined in the Congress, has been a busy man over the last few days. Particularly so with senior JDS leader H.D. Kumaraswamy having left for Singapore for a health checkup soon after voting. He is due to return in time for the counting.

Ibrahim told a few Kannada channels that the JDS would not discriminate between the BJP and the Congress while picking its partner in a hung House.

“Both parties are the same as far as we are concerned. Who withdrew support to (H.D.) Deve Gowda’s government? Who went to Mumbai?” Ibrahim asked.

He was referring to the Congress pulling down H.D. Deve Gowda’s United Front government at the Centre in April 1997, and the BJP’s alleged act of sequestering the 17 turncoats in Mumbai in 2019 when it toppled the JDS-Congress coalition.

The second-placed Congress had been first off the blocks in 2018 when it offered the chief minister’s chair to Kumaraswamy to keep the first-placed BJP out of power. But the BJP came to power following the defections in 2019.

Both the BJP and the Congress have been maintaining they would win an absolute majority this time.

State Congress president Shivakumar told reporters on Friday that he stood by his original estimate of 141 seats although most exit polls suggested the Congress would fall short of a majority.

“I don’t believe in exit polls. Our internal survey gave 141 seats to us; it was based on a much larger sample than any of these exit polls,” he said.

“There is a wave in favour of the Congress. We might even get more than 141 seats.”

Hectic discussions were on at the home of Congress national president Mallikarjun Kharge.

Kharge met senior leaders including former state party chief and one-time deputy chief minister G. Parameshwara, who could be a consensus candidate if there’s another alliance with the JDS.

After meeting Kharge, Parameshwara said the Congress would win over 130 seats.