Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, May 19: Two top Congress leaders from Karnataka, the chief minister-designate Siddaramaiah and his deputy DK Shivakumar arrived in Delhi at summons from the party president Mallikarjun Kharge to finalise the formation of the ministry in the state.
They discussed with the high command leaders the names of the new ministers to be sworn-in with them at the oath-taking ceremony on Saturday and the portfolios of the new ministers. A meeting of the Congress Legislature Party (CLP) held in Bengaluru on Thursday evening formally elected Siddaramaiah as the leader following which he called on the governor and staked his claim to form the government. The governor accepted his claim and invited him to form the government.
Mr. Siddaramaiah and Mr. Shivakumar would take oath as the Chief Minister and Deputy Chief Minister respectively along with a few Ministers at 12.30 p.m. on Saturday at the Kanteerava Stadium in Bengaluru. It is learnt that the party has decided to induct 28 ministers, including the chief minister and the deputy chief minister, at the first go and keep six ministerial berths vacant for the time being for possible future expansion.
“We want to invite our leaders, we want to invite Rahul ji, Sonia ji, Kharge ji and Priyanka ji for the ceremony. They gave their sweat, direction (to the campaign), so I wanted to invite them personally. Later, we are discussing the Cabinet formation,” Shivakumar told reporters after arriving in Delhi.
Asked how many Opposition leaders would attend the swearing-in, Shivakumar said, “we have requested our AICC president to take care of, for us, first is the Congress president and the Gandhi family, we are here to invite them personally.” He asserted that the promises made to the people by the party, particularly the leaders like Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi would be fulfilled in the first cabinet meeting.
Before leaving for Delhi, Shivakumar said fulfilling the promises made to the people was the first priority. “Cabinet, people, all those things we will let you know later, we will not do anything leaving you (media), there is no need for any speculation. We will work unitedly,” he said.
The Congress has promised to implement “guarantees” like 200 units of free power to all households (Gruha Jyoti), ₹2,000 monthly assistance to the woman head of every family (Gruha Lakshmi), 10 kg of rice free to every member of a BPL household (Anna Bhagya), ₹3,000 every month for graduate youth and ₹1,500 for diploma holders (both in the age group of 18-25) for two years (YuvaNidhi), and free travel for women in public transport buses (Shakti), on the first day of assuming power in the State.
The first challenge that Siddaramaiah is expected to face is putting in place a Cabinet with the right combinations that will strike a balance in having representatives from all communities, regions, factions and also from among the old and new generation of legislators. With the sanctioned strength of the Karnataka Cabinet being 34, there are too many aspirants for ministerial berths.
Several national leaders have been invited for the swearing-in ceremony and most of them are coming, he said. Shivakumar also invited leaders of the BJP and JD(S) for the event, stating that as public representatives, they too are part of the government machinery. Earlier, the Deputy CM-designate also visited Kanteerava Stadium, the venue of the ceremony and inspected the preparations there.
Meanwhile some political observers have refuted the BJP claims that Karnataka being a state election and fought on “local issues and not national issues,” the prime minister Narendra Modi could not be blamed for the party’ rout and that the outcome of the Karnataka elections would have no impact in the 2024 Parliamentary elections.
Pointing out that Modi held 19 rallies, six roadshows, the union home minister Home Minister Amit Shah held 16 rallies, 15 roadshows, the BJP president JP Nadda 10 rallies, 16 roadshows, Women and Child Development Minister Smriti Irani: 17 rallies, two roadshows, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister: Nine rallies, three roadshows, Assam Chief Minister: 15 rallies, one roadshow and Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister 13 rallies, suggest that more than the local, the national leaders of the BJP were campaigning in the state elections.
Estimates also suggest that the BJP organised over 9,000 rallies and 1,300 roadshows in the build-up to the Karnataka election. Modi was the face of the campaign. Full-page ads featured his mug shot blooming from the lotus. The model failed in Bengal in May 2021 where Mamata Banerjee of the Trinamool Congress routed Modi’s BJP and Karnataka was a repeat telecast, the experts said.
It was also pointed out that major issues on which the elections were fought were by and large national issues and not local. Unemployment, social harmony, price rise were all national issues and so was making multiple promises on governance and breaking them, the experts said.
Unemployment and price rise were among the most important issues in Karnataka (the other two were social harmony and general non-performance). According to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE), the labour participation rate for youth in Karnataka was 13% compared to 18% pan-India. The state ranks 17th among 22 major states in the gender inequality index. “So, we are not surprised that in the recent elections, only 10 women won out of 224 assembly seats. Of the 28 seats in Lok Sabha, the state has only three women MPs.”
Three days before voting day, the Congress ran a full-page advertisement in local newspapers with the headline, “They robbed the state, they robbed your savings.” The ad highlighted how prices of essential items like rice, milk, wheat, eggs, petrol, LPG cylinders, had shot up between 2014 and 2023. Simple, effective communication. No number of multiple portraits popping out of petals could beat this.
There is enough data to suggest that people vote a little differently between state elections and Lok Sabha (national) elections. But it would be inaccurate to say that voting patterns are completely contrary to each other, the experts claimed.