BENGALURU: He successfully pulled the Congress out of another political crisis but for DK Shivakumar this is no time to rest. A day after the collective efforts of the Congress leadership coupled with Shivakumar’s man-management skills ensured B S Yeddyurappa’s resignation as Chief Minister within 55 hours of taking the oath, the man is still busy strategising for the party’s next move.
At the Hilton hotel where most of Congress’ 78 MLAs are herded, Shivakumar, in a casual black T-shirt, held back-to-back-meetings still focusing on keeping the unity going. The party has now decided to keep the MLAs at the hotel till H D Kumaraswamy’s floor test. The herculean task of keeping the JD(S)- Congress combine MLAs together is far from over for Shivakumar.
“It was expected. We all knew he was going to resign because he never had the numbers,” Shivakumar told Express about Yeddyurappa’s emotional pitch inside the assembly on Saturday. In an exclusive interview with TNIE, Shivakumar spoke about what went wrong for the Congress and how corrective measures were quickly taken to do some damage control. Despite being hailed as the man of the moment, Shivakumar refuses to deem himself a “big leader authorised to take on Shah or Modi”.