Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah has his way, no shake-up in ministry
Bengaluru (IE): Senior ministers in Siddaramaiah’s cabinet heaved a sigh of relief on Sunday as the KPCC Co-ordination Committee decided not to consider the proposal for a shake-up in the Siddaramaiah ministry in the run-up to Assembly election next year.
Chief Minister Siddaramaiah apparently had his way in blocking any moves from Home Minister G Parameshwara to draft some of the senior ministers into party work as part of the plans to strengthen the party to win 2018 poll battle. “There is no proposal for a shake-up of the ministry,” Siddaramaiah told reporters after the KPCC co-ordination committee meeting chaired by Digvijaya Singh AICC General Secretary in-charge of party affairs in Karnataka.
“It(ministry reshuffle) is media’s creation. The issue did not even come up for discussion,” Siddaramaiah said when asked about reports of the plans drop more than 10 senior ministers who are in the ministry for the past four years and draft them for party work. When asked about KPCC President G Parameshwara’s statement on Saturday that the meeting would take a call on the issue, Siddaramaiah said, “Parameshwara did not say that the meeting will discuss the issue. He(Parameshwara) had only stated that there are precedents of ministers being drafted for party work in the run-up to polls.”
The meeting attended by Siddaramaiah, KPCC President G Parameshwara, Congress floor leader in Lok Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge, senior ministers K J George, D K Shivakumar, KPCC Working President Dinesh Gundu Rao and others, dwelt on revamping the party machinery, speeding up drought relief, highlighting achievements of Siddaramaiah government and expose alleged misdeeds of BJP leaders as part of the plans to win the next assembly election.
Speaking to reporters Digvijaya Singh said, the Siddaramaiah government has already fulfilled 136 of the 165 promises it had made in its manifesto. “We will seek people’s mandate on the achievements of the Siddaramaiah government,” he said.
Singh said that KPCC would have a 2-day brain-storming session after the state Budget to draw up plans to fight the next assembly election. The issue of a revamp in the party from block-level to state-level also came up for discussion. However, the question whether Parameshwara should continue as the KPCC chief till the next election or should the party get a new leader was not discussed as it was left to the discretion of the party supremo Sonia Gandhi.