Bengaluru: Three senior MLAs-R.V. Deshpande, B.R. Patil and Basavaraj Rayareddy who could not be accommodated into Siddaramaiah cabinet after the new dispensation came into power in Karnataka were on Friday given postings with cabinet ranks on the orders of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah. The postings will come into effect immediately and remain until further orders.
A senior MLA R.V. Deshpande has been made chairman of Administrative Reforms Commission and he represents Haliyal Assembly seat in Uttara Kannada district while B.R. Patil, a MLA representing Aland in Kalaburagi district, has been made advisor to the Chief Minister. Yelburga MLA Basavaraja Rayareddy has been appointed as the political secretary (financial advisor) to the Chief Minister.
It may be recalled here that B.R. Patil, a loyalist of Siddaramaiah, had dashed off a letter to the Chief Minister Siddaramaiah a couple of months threatening to resign as an MLA citing that developmental works in his constituency have come to halt.
Unhappy over missing out on joining cabinet in Karnataka, Basavaraja Rayareddy had in a public meeting had expressed his displeasure over not being a Minister in the Congress government in Karnataka and he had suggested the party leaders to consider creation of 5 more Deputy Chief Ministers post in addition to the existing lone post of DyCM held by D.K. Shivakumar who is also the president of Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee. “Let D.K. Shivakumar be the principal DyCM or number 1 and others be 2, 3, 4 and so on,” he had felt.
Rayareddy felt that six DyCMs are needed for Karnataka since it is a big State and Andhra Pradesh has such an arrangement of 5 DyCMs for easy governance.
Sources said the postings have been made to pacify the disgruntled MLAs while BJP MLA and Leader of Opposition R. Ashoka criticized Siddaramaiah saying that the State Government has no money to provide drought relief to the farmers but he has enough money to appoint advisors and political secretaries with perks of cabinet rank.
