The Congress’s electoral setback in Haryana may provide some temporary relief to Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah. As the party high command finds itself on the backfoot after the loss in the North Indian state, it would be keen to avoid being held accountable for another political debacle in the south, say party insiders.
Siddaramaiah’s future as chief minister has been come under a cloud after the controversy surrounding the alleged illegal allotment of sites by Mysore Urban Development Authority (MUDA) blew up to become a major political storm. Siddaramaiah is facing investigations by the Lokayukta and the Enforcement Directorate even though his wife Parvathi BM has returned all the 14 sites allotted by MUDA.
“The Congress leadership at this time is on the backfoot and will not want to take the blame for any major change in leadership in Karnataka especially when they have been blamed for giving Bhupinder Singh Hooda a free hand in Haryana that may have contributed to their electoral loss,” political analyst Sandeep Shastri told News18.
The central leadership of the party had told Siddaramaiah to maintain an aggressive posture after he had explained at a meeting in Delhi that he had no role to play in his wife being allotted those sites as, at that point of time, it was as per the MUDA policy. However, after the Karnataka High Court rejected Siddaramaiah’s petition seeking the quashing of the sanction for investigation ordered by Governor Thawarchand Gehlot, Siddaramaiah was pushed into a tight spot.
But one of the three complainants, Snehamayi Krishna, went to the ED to complain, causing quite a scare in the party as it did not want its most powerful chief minister in southern India being questioned or arrested like his counterparts in Delhi or Jharkhand.
“The ED can stoop to any level since it has sought details from the complainant. He (Siddaramaiah) has already publicly stated that he was being singled out by the Opposition because he comes from a Backward Class community. So, it was necessary to politically prove a point. This is why OBC legislators and MPs met him to urge him to bite the bullet by accepting the caste census report,’’ a senior leader pointed out.
About 30 legislators and MPs, accompanied by four former chairmen of the Backward Classes Commission, met Siddaramaiah on Monday to urge him to initiate steps to implement the caste census report. Siddaramaiah promptly told them that he would place it before the Cabinet on October 18. The cabinet meeting will decide whether the report should be put out in the public domain or whether a cabinet subcommittee should be set up to consider it or if it should be placed on the table of the Legislature at its next session in November in Belagavi.
The caste census report, as it is popularly called, is a socio-economic and educational survey of the 7 crore people of the state. “It is not a survey of only the OBCs,” Siddaramaiah had said. This statement was made to allay the apprehension of the upper castes, the Lingayats and Vokkaligas, who have been objecting to the report. The two politically dominant communities fear that their share in the reservation policy of the state would be adversely affected if the caste census report is acted upon.
The opposition BJP and the JD-S have been accusing the chief minister of diverting attention from the alleged MUDA scam by bringing in the caste census report. In the midst of all these issues coming up, meetings of ministers belonging to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes — Dr G Parameshwara, Dr HC Mahadevappa and Satish Jarkiholi — has caused intense speculation in party circles that they are all jockeying to be in the line-up to succeed Siddaramaiah.
But the main candidate who is considered the successor to Siddaramaiah, deputy chief minister DK Shivakumar, has taken the stand that the chief minister will not be changed. “He will remain chief minister for five years,” DK Suresh, former MP and DK Shivakumar’s brother, told reporters on Monday. Suresh’s statement came after his surprise meeting with Satish Jarkiholi. Jarkiholi had rushed to Delhi to meet with Congress president Mallikarjuna Kharge and had just returned.
Jarkiholi, Parameshwara and Mahadevappa have all dismissed speculation of preparing to thwart Shivakumar’s bid for chief ministership. But a senior party leader told News18 on condition of anonymity that the effort is “clearly to be in line to succeed Siddaramaiah”.
“Once the caste census report is readied for implementation, Siddaramaiah could well be asked by the party high command to step aside. This will entirely depend on what the ED does,” the leader added.
Political analyst Shastri says that before placing the caste census report in front of the cabinet, Siddaramaiah needs to get the approval of all his cabinet colleagues, which would be a task.
“The caste census is a double-edged sword for Siddaramaiah. The question that is being raised among his colleagues is that he is releasing it now for political purposes to benefit himself. If the methodology that was adopted to collect the information was done right seven years ago, why wasn’t it released then; why now if not for political gain for himself. These questions he will need to answer,” Shastri said.
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