Chief minister Siddaramaiah has his way, 20 MLAs to get posts

BENGALURU: The Congress high command on Monday finally gave in to chief minister Siddaramaiah's request that MLAs be given a share in the appointments of chairpersons to boards and corporations and agreed that 20 legislators can be accommodated to the total 80 posts.

T he green signal comes as a major relief for Siddaramaiah, who has been relentlessly making a case to the Congress leadership on the need to include legislators in the appointments. The CM, KPCC president G Parameshwara and state unit working president Dinesh Gundu Rao were in New Delhi to get the nod for making the appointments to the boards and corporations and three members to the legislative council und er the nominations category.

After meeting Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi along with AICC general secretary Digvijaya Singh, the CM said the high command had agreed to accommodate 20 MLAs as chiefs to boards and corporations. He'll meet the high command again around November 4.

Senior party MLAs, aspirants for a cabinet berth, are expected to be appointed chairpersons. The names of Mallikaiah V Guttedar, R V Devaraj, H Raju Algur, and Shivanand S Patil, among others, were submitted to Rahul. The AICC vice-president was initially against appointing sitting MLAs to boards and corporations and in his last meeting with the CM in September, he's reported to have questioned the inclusion of elected representatives. "If you give posts to sitting legislators who already enjoy privileges, when will you recognize ordinary workers?" he's learnt to have asked.

The CM reportedly explained that many senior MLAs were unhappy after the cabinet reshuffle and the BJP-JD(S) was trying to poach them. The MLAs have to be humoured to enlist their cooperation with the 2018 assembly elections approaching. Parameshwara is keen that only loyal party workers be given posts.

Nominations: The CM also submitted the list of three members to be nominated to the council. They are P R Ramesh, G C Chandrashekhar or C M LIngappa and K P Nanjundi. The final nod has to be given by Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

Siddaramaiah and Parameshwara also reportedly discussed the name of candidates to contest against former minister V Srinivas Prasad in the Nanjangud bypoll but failed to reach a consensus.