“I am officially announcing that I am going to form a new political party in December,” former Karnataka chief minister BS Yeddyurappa said on Thursday, giving final touches to leaving the BJP. “My party will contest all 224 assembly seats,” he said in Belgaum, eight days after HT first reported that the leader from the politically significant Lingayat community would float a new party. Karnataka polls are due in April-May 2013.

Yeddyurappa, however, added that he would not destabilise the Bharatiya Janata Party government led by CM Jagadish Shettar. “Let it complete its term.” Yeddyurappa, credited with leading the BJP to power on its own (just three seats short of a majority) for the first time in a south Indian state in 2008, said his party could be named Karnataka Janata Paksha.

On the history of regional parties failing in the state, he said, “My party is going to get 100% success. I know what I have done for the state and the people know what I stand for.”

Yeddyurappa, who failed to get back to power after being forced to quit in July last year following his indictment by the lokayukta on charges of corruption in a mining scam, said he would not tie-up with other parties. “Good people from other parties such as the Congress and Janata Dal (Secular) will, however, be welcomed into our party after a through inquiry.”

He vowed not to allow the JD(S), which he termed the “father-son party” in a dig at former PM HD Deve Gowda and his son HD Kumaraswamy, to come to power in the state.