Chief Minister Siddaramaiah fells his rivals, plays the Dalit card

Bengaluru: Chief Minister Siddaramaiah won the round against deputy chief ministerial aspirant and Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee president, Dr G. Parameshwara with a clever sleight of the caste hand. Mr Siddaramaiah worked on two fronts. On the one hand, he persuaded AICC vice president Rahul Gandhi on the need to put a cabinet expansion on hold, while at the same time, eating into Dr Parameshwar’s support base, sources revealed.

During his presentation to Mr Gandhi, Mr Siddaramaiah reportedly blew a hole in the argument that inducting Dr Parameshwar as deputy chief minister would ensure social justice to SC and STs as that issue had already been addressed with the induction of several members of the SC-ST community into the cabinet. Instead, Mr Siddaramaiah emphasised the need to hold elections to various local bodies in the state in the next six months to one year before a cabinet expansion.

The CM also said the KPCC chief’s insistence on getting the DyCM post was behind the delay in cabinet expansion. Speaking to Deccan Chronicle, a senior leader in the chief minster’s camp said that Mr Siddarmaiah gave a detailed explanation on how he has ‘genuinely’ made an attempt to accommodate every possible community into his cabinet, even at the cost of his own community.

"Most leaders who become chief minister in Karnataka, bring in their own community members as ministers, but, Mr Siddaramaiah ensured that at the cost of his community's share, he accommodated other communities especially Dalits. There are five Dalit ministers in his cabinet already. Two belong to the Chalavadi community to which Dr Parameshwar belongs, one each from the Madigas, Bhovi and Lambani communities respectively," he explained. Apart from this, Mr Siddarmaiah is learnt to have said that both ministers belonging to the Chalavadi sect - Revenue minister, V. Srinivas Prasad and PWD minister, Dr H. C. Mahdevappa - were senior leaders among the Chalavadis as compared to Dr Parameshwara.

"Therefore, it would be inappropriate to drop any one of these ministers from his cabinet and accommodate the KPCC chief, as this would again lead to a backlash from the community. As a consequence of this, there is no need for cabinet expansion at this juncture. Instead we can postpone the exercise until the conclusion of local bodies elections in the next six months to one year's time," the source explained quoting Mr Siddaramaiah who reportedly explained this to Mr Rahul Gandhi in Delhi, when he met him last week.

Apart from this, when Mr Siddarmaiah met various leaders who were lobbying for ministers' post in Delhi, told them bluntly during an off the record interaction that Dr Parameshwara was the reason behind the delay in the cabinet expansion exercise. Another senior leader told this newspaper that the chief minister, also told them that without the inclusion of Dr Parameshwara, it would not be appropriate to carry out cabinet expansion. Convince Dr Parameshwar to accept any minister's portfolio in my cabinet, then I can try and convince party central leaders to rethink about their decision to allow me to expand the cabinet in the state."  

Yet another senior leader from the Lingayat community disclosed on the condition of anonymity that Mr Siddaramaiah also blamed Dr Parameshwara for sabotaging the efforts of leaders of other communities from getting into cabinet. This came as a blessing in disguise to the CM and his camp as it drove a wedge between those loyal to Dr Parameshwara and the opposing camp. "Chief Minister, Siddaramaiah who has seen many rebellions during his long stint in Janata Parivar is a master at using one camp against another. This he is successfully doing to widen the rift between, party loyalists which comprises of Lingayats, Vokkaligas and the other communities," the source claimed.