BENGALURU: With the leadership tussle becoming more contentious, RDPR Minister Priyank Kharge, who is also AICC president Mallikarjuna Kharge’s son, met Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi in New Delhi on Tuesday, and held a detailed talk on the state’s political situation, according to sources.
Details of what transpired during the meeting are not known. However, soon after landing in Bengaluru from Delhi, Priyank met Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and DCM DK Shivakumar separately for about half-an-hour each, and reportedly conveyed Rahul’s message to both leaders, sources said.
Earlier in the day, Shivakumar met AICC president Mallikarjuna Kharge, who was bound for Delhi, and accompanied him up to the airport where he received an emergency call, speculated to be from the central leadership in New Delhi.
Landing in Delhi, Kharge clarified that he would meet Rahul Gandhi only if the latter calls for a meeting. “It is not a subject (change in leadership) to be talked about here openly, I came here to attend Constitution Day. Normally, the party president does not go on his own to discuss this. If a meeting is scheduled, I will discuss it,” he told reporters. Since Priyank had already met Rahul Gandhi and briefed him on the state’s situation, Kharge found no reason to meet Rahul, sources said.
Interestingly, Housing Minister Zameer Ahmed Khan played Siddaramaiah’s envoy and offered an olive branch to Shivakumar. According to sources, this happened after Siddaramaiah held a meeting with his coterie of ministers.
Meanwhile, CM’s close aide and former minister KN Rajanna, in an interview with a private TV channel, asserted that Home Minister Dr G Parameshwara deserved the CM’s post if Siddaramaiah were to step down. “Parameshwara toiled for the party to come to power in 2013 but lost miserably, and he is not second to DK Shivakumar. If Shivakumar becomes CM, I wouldn’t like to be in his cabinet,” he said.
He alleged that Shivakumar collected signatures from MLAs, and had visited Vinay Kulakarni and Veerendra Pappi in jail for this purpose. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have visited them in such urgency, he alleged.
According to sources, the Congress high command, besides reminding Siddaramaiah of the power-sharing pact, is likely to strike a balance between him and Shivakumar, as both cannot be ignored. A formula could be worked out by taking Siddaramaiah’s word to transfer power at an appropriate time, and allow him to go ahead with the cabinet reshuffle, sources added.
As soon as Rahul Gandhi gave Siddaramaiah the green signal for a cabinet reshuffle during his visit last time, Shivakumar swung into action to counter it which appears to be working in his favour, to gain the high command’s word on the chief minister’s post, analysts pointed out.