CLP meet: Siddaramaiah may need to do tightrope walking

Amid simmering discontent among party men, the Congress will hold its legislature party meeting at the Suvarna Vidhana Soudha here, on issues including Cabinet expansion and appointments to boards and corporations on Tuesday.

The CLP is being held amid veiled threats by Congress MLAs, especially those aspiring for Cabinet berths, about giving the session a miss.

Though the coalition partners have already announced that the Cabinet expansion will happen on December 22, the MLAs are skeptical. They feel that the expansion will not take place until after the Lok Sabha polls.

The faction ridden Congress is facing pressure from two camps. While one faction led by MLAs Ramesh Jarkiholi and M B Patil has been continuously mounting pressure on the party leadership seeking Cabinet berths, another camp, including MLAs like Ramalinga Reddy, Roshan Baig and MTB Nagaraj, is upset with CLP leader Siddaramaiah for playing “favourites”.

With the meeting is expected to be stormy, Siddaramaiah will be forced to do some tightrope walking.

The meeting is also expected to discuss issues related to alleged discrimination faced by party MLAs, especially by JD(S) Minister H D Revanna, Congress leader S R Patil being ignored for the Council chairman's post and fund allocation to Congress MLAs.

Kumaraswamy himself was supposed to take part in the meeting. But he will give the meeting a miss as he is leaving for Tirupathi.

Amidst rumours that the government might merely go for a reshuffle as opposed to a Cabinet expansion, KPCC president Dinesh Gundu Rao said it had been decided that the Cabinet expansion would take place on December 22, but the high command would take a call on whether there would be reshuffle as well.

Siddaramaiah reiterated that the party would go ahead with the second round of expansion.

"The CLP will not discuss Cabinet expansion as the date has been fixed. There's no going back on that. The high command will decide on the berths. In addition to appointments to boards and corporations, we will also be appointing eight to 10 parliamentary secretaries," he said.

Siddaramaiah said, "Kumaraswamy will be part of the joint party meeting which will be held soon after the winter session."