BENGALURU: Various groups within the Congress legislature party (CLP) are blaming each other for adding a controversial demand — replace party general secretary in-charge of Karnataka, Digvijay Singh,—while deciding to mount pressure on senior central leaders for a quick reshuffle of the cabinet.
Such a blame-game could well impact Chief Minister Siddaramaiah's ambitious plan to drop 10-12 nonperforming ministers and even put the question mark on the future course of action of this group of MLAs.
Even though their intentions appear to be the same as far as the demand for sacking of ministers with poor performance records, they seem to be divided in their approach to achieve this result.
A senior leader in the Chief Minister's camp disclosed to this newspaper that though the plan to invite MLAs for dinner was “their plan” but the plan to include the demand for change of Mr Singh came from MLAs who do not belong to the CM’s camp.
"Generally, there are MLAs who are neither staunch supporters’ of the Chief Minister nor bitter critics of him. They are the ones who sought the change of Mr Singh and in order to keep the momentum going, and as a group decided to include it in the most tacit manner," the leader added. He, however, declined to divulge the names of those MLAs who wanted Mr Singh replaced.
Meanwhile, when contacted several MLAs who are generally not seen with Mr Siddaramaiah or his camp, countered that the dinner meet was convened by members of the CM camp and they were the ones who picked legislators for the occasion.
"Several issues raised by us were not even considered worthy of discussion, but it was resolved that change of AICC general secretary was necessary as everyone in the group unanimously felt that Mr Singh was not able to devote time and attention to affairs of the state unit as he is among the busiest leaders in New Delhi. Therefore, the meeting unanimously felt it necessary to seek change ahead of 2018 Assembly polls," the leader added.
In addition, the leader added that replacement of Mr Singh was a demand based on his "busy schedule" not based on whether he was close to Mr Siddaramaiah or not.
Let any general secretary be made incharge of Karnataka or any other state, they will be automatically be close to the state's top leaders such as CM and PCC president.
Ahead of 2013 Assembly polls Madusudhan Mistry was the in-charge secretary, and it was alleged that he was too close to KPCC president, Dr G. Parameshwar.
