BENGALURU: A day after the cabinet rejig, rebellion within the Congress swelled posing a serious challenge to the Siddaramaiah government. On Monday, dropped minister and ‘Rebel Star’ MH Ambareesh resigned from his Assembly membership. Other dissidents threatened to follow suit, forcing the Chief Minister to firefight even as he faced the headache of portfolio allocation, with some ministers lobbying for meaty berths.
Meanwhile, Ambareesh’s resignation was not accepted by Deputy Speaker of State Assembly Shivashankar Reddy. “The resignation is not in order. The concerned member should submit it in person,” Reddy said explaining why the single line resignation letter sent through Ambareesh’s aide was rejected.
Also, a group of disappointed ministerial aspirants led by Yeshwantpur MLA ST Somashekar formed a forum of like-minded Congress MLAs and convened their first meeting on Tuesday. The forum has backed Ambareesh and another dropped minister Srinivasa Prasad.
Somashekar warned the party leadership of serious consequences if their grievances were not redressed. He claimed that their number has touched 40 and threatened that they would quit en masse if “the injustice done to them during the cabinet rejig was not set right”.
Somashekar questioned the induction of first-time MLA Priyank Kharge in the ministry while the claim for ministerial berths from other first-time MLAs of Bengaluru, including himself, was rejected. The raging dissidence forced Siddaramaiah to go into damage control mode. He spoke to Ambareesh and appealed to him not to quit. He assured to speak to him personally and assuage his hurt feelings.
The chief minister also appealed to all the disgruntled ministerial aspirants to understand the limitations of the system that has provision for just 34 members in the ministry. Portfolio allocation is expected to be announced on Tuesday as discussions continued late into Monday.