Jagadish Shettar took oath as the 27th Chief Minister of Karnataka along with 33 ministers at a simple ceremony at Raj Bhavan here on Thursday. But the exercise has left former chief minister B S Yeddyurappa, at whose behest the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) recast the government, sulking over the Cabinet composition.
As expected, two Deputy Chief Ministers — K S Eshwarappa and R Ashok — also took oath. The move is seen as an exercise to prevent Shettar from playing into the hands of Yeddyurappa who was responsible for his elevation to the top post. This is also meant to keep Shettar from rising above the party like Yeddyurappa, by using his caste to his advantage.
Shettar, however, retained all ministers from Gowda’s Cabinet besides including 12 new faces. Of the new faces, the anti-Yeddyurappa camp took the major share with six of them — Eshwarappa, C T Ravi, Appachchu Ranjan, Sogadu Shivanna, Aravind Limbavali and S K Bellubbi — getting Cabinet berths.
Though the Yeddyurappa group got three berths, two of them — Anand Singh and Sunil Vallyapure — were inducted purely on caste and regional compulsions and not because of their allegiance to the Lingayat leader. B J Puttaswamy was the only member of his choice to make it to the Cabinet.
The former CM was keen on making C C Patil and Lakshman Savadi, both accused in the Assembly sleaze clip episode, as ministers. But the party high command had reportedly turned down the proposal, thus signalling its intent to free the state from Yeddyurappa’s control.
While Kalakappa Bandi’s loyalty to Shettar got him a Cabinet berth, MLC Kota Srinivas Poojary made it to the Cabinet as the RSS choice. The last minute induction of Poojary has left Kundapur MLA Haladi Srinivas Shetty fuming as he had come prepared to take oath following an invitation from the party. Shetty’s name was reportedly dropped on the instance of an RSS leader from Mangalore. Shetty is now planning to resign in protest.
The discontent was not restricted to Shetty alone. Several MLAs, mostly Lingayats led by C C Patil were unhappy at not being accommodated in the Cabinet. On his part, Karunakar Reddy, one of the Bellary Reddy brothers, was also upset and threatened to quit the party. However, the party expressed confidence over putting down dissidence.
The exercise however saw the party’s loyal MLAs getting their due. Ever since the party came to power in 2008, it was outsiders who used to walk away with the cake as loyals were made to wait on the sidelines.
The party delayed announcing portfolios due to pulls and pressures. While Eshwarappa demanded the Finance portfolio citing “convention”, when former deputy chief ministers Siddaramaiah and Yeddyurappa handled the portfolio, Shettar is said to have offered him Revenue. The party will decide on this after general secretary Devendra Pradhan visits Bangalore on Friday.