Bangalore/New Delhi, Sep 20 (IANS) The two-year-old Bharatiya Janata Party ministry in Karnataka will be reshuffled Sep 22 amid high drama as one minister threatened suicide and another warned of mass resignations if they were dropped.
‘Definitely, it will take place Sep 22,’ the BJP government’s special representative in New Delhi V. Dhananjaya Kumar said.
The final list of who to be axed and who to be taken in will be ready late Monday after a discussion of the BJP central leaders who were briefed earlier in the day by Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa and state party chief K.S. Eshwarappa.
Though there was indication that Yeddyurappa and Eshwarappa would be present at the late Monday meeting, the two left for Bangalore after briefing party senior leader L.K. Advani.
As Yedyurappa and Eshwarappa met party president Nitin Gadkari and other central leaders in Delhi, there was high drama in Bangalore starting with a suicide threat by Sports and Youth Services minister Goolihatti Shekar.
The drama continued late Monday with seven legislators, including two cabinet aspirants, C.T. Ravi and S.K. Bellubbi, huddled in a hotel in Bangalore to decide their action plan following reports that the two may not be made ministers in the shuffle.
‘Suicide is not ruled out if I am dropped. I had been promised that I will remain in the cabinet for the full term of five years. If the BJP does not keep its word, then let its flag fly over my body,’ Shekar told reporters as speculation mounted that he is one of the three or four ministers to be dropped.
Shekar is one of the five Independents who were rewarded with a ministry for helping the BJP form its first government in Karnataka as well as south India in May 2008 when the party fell short of majority in the 225-member (including one nominated) assembly.
Shekar’s colleague, Minister for Public Libraries and Mass Education K. Shivangouda Naik, threatened to quit the party if he was axed in the reshuffle.
Naik, who won in 2008 assembly polls as a Janata Dal-Secular candidate, later quit the assembly, joined the BJP, won a by-poll and was made a minister.
And legislator Belur Gopalakrishna, aspiring for a cabinet berth, warned: ‘Around 20 BJP legislators will quit the party if I am not made minister.’
Gopalakrishna, who was ticked off by the state BJP chief week after he demanded a cabinet berth, said he has been insulted as has been his community (he belongs to Ediga community, whose main occupation in the past was toddy tapping).
Tourism Minister and mining baron G. Janardhana Reddy, who played a major role in winning over the five Independents, said in Bellary there was no question of dropping any of them from the ministry.
‘They helped the party when in need. I have discussed the matter with party president Nitin Gadkari. They will not be dropped,’ asserted Reddy, who almost brought the Yeddyurappa ministry down in October-November last year.
Yeddyurappa and Eshwarappa sought the central leadership’s help as the core committee comprising senior state BJP leaders and functionaries of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) could not finalise the list after talks Saturday and Sunday.
Eshwarappa played down the threats of suicide and resignations.
‘It is natural for legislators to aspire to be ministers. BJP is a disciplined party. We will convince everybody,’ he told reporters in Delhi.
Karnataka can have a ministry strength of 34, inclusive of the chief minister, as stipulated by the constitution.
There are three vacancies in the ministry created by the resignations of ministers over various scandals.
