Siddaramaiah, Shivakumar In Delhi; Congress To Decide Karnataka CM Today

The suspense over the appointment of chief minister continues in Karnataka with state Congress president D K Shivakumar, one of the two contenders to the post, scheduled to arrive in Delhi on Tuesday ahead of an announcement by the party.

On the other hand, Congress leader and former CM Siddaramaiah, who is also a frontrunner for the CM post, had arrived in New Delhi on Monday evening.

Shivakumar however stayed behind in Bengaluru yesterday citing stomach infection. Both the leaders had been called to Delhi by the top leadership of the Congress party for a discussion.

Congress got a clear mandate in the Karnataka Assembly polls, winning 135 seats in the 224-member Karnataka assembly.

Earlier yesterday, the party's central observers for Karnataka had  briefed Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge on the views of the newly elected MLAs. According to reports, Kharge will consult Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra before announcing a final decision.

"The name of the next Karnataka CM will be announced in the coming 24 hours," they said.

Notably, the Congress legislative party had met on Sunday in Bengaluru and passed a one-line resolution empowering Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge to pick the head of the legislative party.

On Monday, Shivakumar said that all the MLAs are together and the call on the chief minister will be taken by the party's high command.

“The party high command will take a call. I don't want to comment or speak anything more. Whatever I had to speak, I have spoken already. I do not want MLAs (support)...that is not important to me. Ours is a Congress block. 135 is the number and one more ally member. We all are one and will work together,” Shivkumar said.

Siddaramaiah, who served as chief minister of Karnataka from 2013-2018, had met with the top leadership of the All India Congress Committee (AICC) at Delhi's Lodhi Hotel late on Monday night.

He however remained tight-lipped on the meeting and did not interact with the reporters.

Also Read: CLP Authorizes Mallikarjun Kharge to Select New Karnataka CM