Siddaramaiah

For someone who had a near miss with formal education, Siddaramaiah has come a long way, changing his political colours, demonstrating wizardry with budget finances, but never losing the common touch

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Ending days of suspense, the Congress today announced Siddaramaiah as the next Chief Minister of Karnataka and D K Shivakumar as his only deputy in the soon-to-formed cabinet.

Karnataka CM News Highlights: Congress delegation, including CM-designate Siddaramaiah and Deputy CM-designate DK Shivakumar, meet Governor Thaawarchand Gehlot at Raj Bhavan to stake claim to form the Government. He invites Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar to take oath along with team members. The oath taking ceremony will take place at 12.30 pm on 20th May in Kanteerava Stadium, Bengaluru.

The Opposition party asserted that Karnataka will have a five-year-long stable government and urged people not to believe in speculation and "fake news" which it alleged was being peddled by the BJP.

The top Congress leadership has concerns that any questioning of Shivakumar in cases related to money laundering, income tax evasion, and disproportionate assets against him can affect the administration's functioning. 

Karnataka News Highlights: Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge has met with all stakeholders on deciding the Karnataka CM candidate, and that the announcement may be made tomorow in Bengaluru, according to sources quoted by ANI.

Siddaramaiah, 75, was the state's chief minister from 2013 to 2018, and was the leader of opposition in the outgoing assembly.

Congress scored a thumping win in the May 10 Assembly polls as it secured 135 seats out of 224, while the BJP bagged only 66.

The party has called a meeting on May 14 to discuss government formation and select a leader for the state. Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will meet Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar to discuss the chief ministerial position.

The 75-year-old leader got 1,19,430 votes against 73,424 polled by his BJP rival and influential Lingayat leader V Somanna.

He also hoped that former Congress president Rahul Gandhi would become the Prime Minister.

“We are confident that we are going to get a majority, and we wont be needing any other party’s alliance. In the interest of the state, my father should become the CM,” Yathindra Siddaramaiah has said.

The electoral outcome in Varuna will clearly have a bearing on the state’s political landscape post these elections.

In an interview to PTI Video, the excerpts of which were released on Monday, he further said there was nothing wrong in state Congress President DK Shivakumar also aspiring for the chief minister’s post in the event of the party winning the May 10 Assembly polls, as ”healthy competition” was fine.

A Twitter spat occured between Foreign Minister S Jaishankar and Congress' Siddaramaiah on the evening of April 18 over the former Karnataka Chief Minister's remarks on the safety of 31 tribals belonging to the Hakki Pikki community of Karnataka, stranded in Sudan.

Siddaramaiah said that the state’s milk production has been affected since the day the union cooperative minister spoke about the possibility of a merger between KMF and Gujarat’s dairy-based cooperative society Amul.

He said he wants to contest from Kolar too along with Varuna, if the party agrees. The Congress earlier in the day announced its first list of 124 candidates for the polls, due by May, which included the announcement of Siddaramiah’s candidacy from Varuna.

"I have decided to be a candidate for the next election from Kolar," Siddaramaiah said at the party workers meeting in Kolar, amid loud cheers from the crowd.

Addressing reporters at the airport here, he said eight moral policing incidents have been reported in Dakshina Kannada in the recent past. Condemning such acts by anti-social elements, he said strict action should be taken against those involved in moral policing.