KPCC rejig to relieve ministers of key roles?

Maqsood Maniyar | NT

Bengaluru: The Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee reorganization due in September is likely to relieve Cabinet ministers of party duties and assign the same to other workers.

However, it is being said that Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar will continue as Karnataka Congress chief for now as his abilities as an organizer are appreciated by the party’s central leadership.

All India Congress Committee state in-charge Randeep Singh Surjewala also appears to be safe in his position. The goal in Shivakumar’s own words is to win 20 of the 28 Lok Sabha elections and to accomplish the same office bearers need to set aside a lot of time, which may not be feasible for Cabinet ministers.

On the other hand, it is noteworthy that three of the five KPCC working presidents are ministers: Ramalinga Reddy (Transport), Eshwar Khandre (Forests) and Satish Jarkiholi (Public Works).

The other two are Saleem Ahmed and BN Chandrappa, who was the replacement of R Dhruvaranayana, who passed away back in March. It is to be noted that each working president of the state unit represents a different community.

The Transport Minister is a Reddy, Khandre is a Lingayat, Jarkiholi comes from the Nayaka community, which is a Scheduled Tribe (ST), Saleem is a Muslim while Chandrappa is a Dalit like Dhruvaranayana before him.

An educated guess would be that the ministers would make way for fellow community members. Moreover, KPCC campaign committee chairman MB Patil is the Minister for Large and Small Scale Industries.

Priyank Kharge holds the responsibilities of the state Congress communications chair man and the RDPR and IT-BT Minister. Home Minister G Parameshwara is also the KPCC manifesto committee chairman.

This is a total of seven Congressmen who currently hold key responsibilities in both the State government and the state unit of the party. They were also incharge of various districts.