As Cong does balancing act, seniors miss the bus

The Congress’ effort in striking a balance between experience and youth while also taking care of caste and regional equations has forced the party to leave out some seniors such as H K Patil and Ramalinga Reddy from the Cabinet.

The names of senior leaders H K Patil, Ramalinga Reddy, M B Patil, Shamanur Shivashankarappa, S R Patil, R Roshan Baig among others were doing the rounds in the run up to the Cabinet expansion on Wednesday.

Congress president Rahul Gandhi was keen on giving fresh faces a chance. Accordingly, the party chose
N H Shivashankara Reddy (Gauribidanur), Shivanand Patil (Basavana Bagewadi), C Puttarangashetty (Chamarajnagar) and R Shankar (Ranebennur) for the Cabinet.

The party seems to have tried its best to also ensure castes and communities get due representation in the Cabinet. Besides three Vokkaligas and two Lingayats, the party found an Ediga in Jayamala (MLC). Likewise, Venkataramanappa (SC-Bhovi), Puttarangashetty (Uppara), Ramesh Jarkiholi (ST), Priyank Kharge (SC), U T Khader and B Z Zameer Ahmed Khan (Muslim), R V Deshpande (Brahmin) and K J George (Christian) havebeen accommodated. Some of the seniors who missed the bus are miffed, with a few of them even making their dismay public. However, they are confident that they will get their chance, because the Congress has filled up only 15 of its share of 22 Cabinet berths.

A section of disgruntled Congress legislators, who failed to make it to the Cabinet, held a discussion at a star hotel in Bengaluru on Wednesday, and decided to take up the issue with the party high command.

Sources said legislators Satish Jarkiholi, K Sudhakar, B C Patil, Eshwar Khandre, Rahim Khan among others met and held discussion for more than an hour. The move is seen as a pressure-building tactic by the MLAs on the party high command.