A week-long hectic parley before a breakthrough in mid-May this year saw the Congress party finally pick Siddaramaiah as the Karnataka chief minister and KPCC chief D.K. Shivakumar as the sole deputy, a formula that was agreed to by the two top contenders for the CM’s post.
Within four months, the party finds itself in the damage-control mode as the two factions are again at loggerheads, in a bid to diminish each other’s stature. The demand for creation of six deputy chief minister’s posts citing “social justice” and the upcoming Lok Sabha polls has embarrassed the party high command, which has termed any such remarks as “unacceptable and unwarranted”.
According to a letter by K.C. Venugopal, AICC general secretary (organisation), any such remarks with regard to the post of chief minister and number of deputy chief ministers go against the party interest and were merely rumours. He also urged the party leaders to raise issued related to the party and the government only in the party forum and not in public glare.
Last week, Cooperation Minister K.N. Rajanna had mooted creation of three deputy chief minister posts to give representation to the Lingayat, SC/ST and minority communities, stating they had backed the Congress in the Assembly polls and it would be beneficial to the party in the upcoming LS polls too.
Seconding the demand was Yelburga (Koppal) MLA Basavaraj Rayareddi who claimed there was a proposal to appoint five more deputy chief ministers.
“There should be at least six deputy CMs for a big state Karnataka similar to Andhra, where Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy also appointed five deputies,” said Rayareddi.
Giving credence to his claim was Home Minister G. Parameshwara, Industries minister M.B. Patil and PWD Minister Satish Jarkiholi openly supporting the proposal. While Parameshwara defended Rajanna’s opinion saying it was “not wrong”, Jarkiholi said he was ready to become the deputy CM if the party gave him a chance. “Having multiple deputy CMs ensures adequate representation to various communities and upholds social justice,” said Jarkiholi.
Parameshwara, who was the longest-serving KPCC chief and a keen contender for the CM’s post, served as the deputy chief minister during the JDS-Congress coalition government. On several occasions, he has expressed his disappointment over dalit leaders being deprived of the top post.
“Shivakumar is a good organisational man. He can be the principal deputy CM and other deputies can be his subordinates. Having five deputy CM posts will certainly benefit the party in the polls,” said Rayareddi, who added that Siddaramaiah would complete a full term as the chief minister contrary to the speculations over his stepping down after 2.5 years.
Shivakumar, annoyed by the statements, said the chief minister was the right person to respond to such demands.
Another Siddaramaiah loyalist and health minister Dinesh Gundu Rao suggested that Siddaramaiah should continue as the CM for the five years owing to his “good performance”, making it obvious that the two warring factions were trying to prop up their leaders’ image.
The demand for additional deputy CMs is being read as a counter from the Siddaramaiah faction after OBC leader and MLC B.K. Hariprasad, who identifies with the Shivakumar faction, questioned the CM's credentials as a socialist leader. Hariprasad, a former Rajya Sabha MP who has been sulking over being denied a cabinet berth by Siddaramaiah, launched a veiled attack against the CM during a rally of OBC communities on September 9.
“Someone who wears a panche (dhoti), a Hublot watch, and a khaki chaddi inside cannot be a socialist,” Hariprasad had said indirectly referring to a controversy over Siddaramaiah accepting an expensive (diamond-studded) watch during his earlier stint as the chief minister in 2016.
AICC’s disciplinary action committee issued a showcause notice to Hariprasad stating he was accused of “criticising Chief Minister Siddaramaiah publicly and sharing the dais with BJP and YSR Congress party leaders at a Backward Class conference held at Bengaluru”.
Soon, the party also sent Home Minister Parameshwara and other leader to convince him to attend the Congress Working Committee (CWC) meeting in Hyderabad.
The Siddaramaiah faction is rankled by Hariprasad’s frequent outbursts against the chief minister as they suspect that it is a strategy to diminish the stature of Siddaramaiah as the undisputed leader of the OBC community in the state. Siddaramaiah, a Kuruba holds sway over the Ahinda (minorities, dalit and backward classes) votebank, while Hariprasad belongs to the Ediga (Billava) community and is hoping to emerge as a mass leader from the OBC community like former chief minister late S. Bangarappa.
The Congress high command sees a ploy of the opposition parties in the demand for additional deputies. “The ‘Karnataka Model’ is being spoken about and emulated across the country. The success of these (guarantee) welfare measures has made the BJP and other regional parties jittery and uncomfortable. In the usual tactic of diversion and manipulation, they are now using a section of the media to fuel wholly unwarranted rumours with regard to the post of chief minister and number of deputy chief ministers,” said the letter from Venugopal that said the party had “noted with concern” that few Congress leaders and ministers had chosen to comment upon these rumours by “falling prey to the propaganda of the BJP and other regional outfits”.
Bengaluru South MP Tejaswi Surya in his X post suggested the infighting in the Congress was affecting governance in the state. “Karnataka Congress MLA proposes half a dozen deputy CMs for Karnataka. Why not declare every Minister as a deputy CM? This is the state of affairs of the Congress party and its government in Karnataka. The only casualty in all this politicking is the governance in the state,” he said.
Both the Congress and the BJP have experimented with having multiple deputies in the past though it is believed to undermine the importance of the chief minister. While it has been a norm to have deputy chief ministers in a coalition government, the single-party governments appointing deputies owing to their seniority in the party is not uncommon.
The first deputy CM of Karnataka was S.M. Krishna (1992), when M. Veerappa Moily was the chief minister while Siddaramaiah was J.H. Patel’s deputy in 1996. In 2012, BJP veterans K.S. Eshwarappa and R. Ashok were sworn in as deputies to Jagadish Shettar.
Again in 2019, the BJP appointed three deputies appointed three deputy chief ministers in the B.S. Yediyurappa cabinet. Govind Karajol (Dalit), Laxman Savadi (Lingayat) and Dr C.N. Ashwathnarayan (Vokkaliga) were sworn in as deputies to expand its vote base and to keep its traditional supporters in good humour.
The previous Congress government (2013-2018) under Siddaramaiah did not have a deputy CM. The Basavaraj Bommai cabinet did away with the deputies.
Prior to the Assembly polls, the Congress party had appointed five working presidents to give adequate representation to all communities by picking and Ramalinga Reddy (Reddy), Eshwar Khandre (Lingayat), Saleem Ahmed (Muslim- minority) and Satish Jarkiholi (ST) and R Dhruvanarayana (SC) as deputies to the KPCC chief. However, the appointment of deputies to the chief minister has now triggered a debate over social justice though it is a reflection of the growing factional feud in the party.