Karnataka power tussle: After call from Congress high command, Siddaramaiah invites Shivakumar for breakfast

“The high command has telephoned him (Shivakumar) and me and suggested that we should have a meeting. As a result I have called him for a breakfast meeting. When he comes for breakfast we will discuss issues,” Siddaramaiah said on Friday evening.

“There is no change in my stand. I have said that I will follow the directives of the high command and I will stick to that stand tomorrow also at the meeting. He also said several times that he would abide by the directions of the high command. We will discuss,” the CM said.

He said he has not been called to Delhi. “If I am called I will go,” he said.

Shivakumar on Friday said he was in no hurry to become the CM of Karnataka. “The party workers may be eager, but I am in no hurry. The party will take all the decisions,” he said on the sidelines of an event.

The Deputy CM has been claiming that there was an unwritten agreement between him, Siddaramaiah and the Congress leaders in Delhi for sharing of power for 2.5 years each when the Karnataka government was formed in May 2023 after the Congress won 135 of 224 Assembly seats in the state. Siddaramaiah has rejected any suggestion of an agreement.

With the Congress leadership also hinting that Siddaramaiah, who is the foremost leader of the OBC Kuruba community in Karnataka and also enjoys the support of Dalits and minorities, is not likely to be replaced immediately, Shivakumar is seen to have made a desperate push for clarity on his CM prospects.

Shivakumar, who belongs to the dominant Vokkaliga community which has traditionally allied with the JD(S) of former PM H D Deve Gowda, is keen to have at least two years of tenure as CM, including the presentation of 2026 budget, Congress sources said.

Among his conditions for a status quo on the CM’s post is reportedly a pause by the Congress high command on efforts by Siddaramaiah to carry out a cabinet reshuffle, which the CM has been pushing for with Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and senior party leader Rahul Gandhi. The Cabinet reshuffle is seen by the Deputy CM as a sign of continuance of Siddaramaiah as the CM for a tenure beyond 2026, sources said.

Shivakumar’s other conditions include his continuance as the sole deputy CM and Karnataka Congress president, continuation as the Bengaluru minister where mega projects worth crores conceived under Shivakumar are in the pipeline, and the post of the president of the state milk federation for his brother, Congress sources said.

Siddaramaiah, on the other hand, is keen to make the record for the longest-serving CM of Karnataka on January 7, when he will surpass the seven years and 10 month tenure record of former CM Devaraj Urs, said the sources, adding that he is likely to cite this wish if pushed to quit.

The CM is also keen on seeing through a caste survey and its implementation, which is the core issue of the Congress and Rahul Gandhi.

The caste survey has been re-done by the state’s Backward Classes Commission after leaders from dominant communities, including Shivakumar, objected to the survey report from 2015 when Siddaramaiah served his first term as the CM.

With Shivakumar launching an open challenge for the CM’s post, despite lacking support in the form of actual numbers from the 135 Congress legislators, the majority of whom are from Dalit and backward communities, Karnataka has witnessed a flurry of meetings of sub-groups of leaders over the past week.