Congress workers stage protest after leader denied Ministerial post in Siddaramaiah govt

A week after assuming power in Karnataka, the Congress party in the state on Friday announced the list of 24 legislators who would be sworn in as Ministers, filling up all the vacant ministerial positions. While the party claimed that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah had ensured caste and region-wise representation, this move has sparked discontent among the supporters of Congress leader Rudrappa Lamani.

Outside the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) office, supporters of Rudrappa Lamani staged a protest, demanding a Ministerial post for their leader, ANI reported. According to one of the protesting supporters, Lamani's name was reportedly present on the list until Friday night, only to be excluded when it was officially released. Notably, Lamani who won the 2023 Karnataka Assembly elections from the Haveri constituency with an 11,915 vote margin, was not featured in the list of 24 names that were shortlisted for the Ministerial posts. 

'We gave our 75% vote to Congress in the election': Protesting Congress workers

Expressing their disappointment over Congress' list of leaders who will be sworn in as Ministers, one of the supporters of Lamani stated, "Our Banjara community leader Rudrappa Lamani's name was there on the list till last night, but today we saw that his name was not there on the list. If our leader will not get the ministerial post, we will protest against this because we gave our 75% vote to Congress in the election, so there should be at least one leader from our community."

24 MLAs to take oath as Ministers in Karnataka

According to Congress lits, MLAs HK Patil, Krishna Byregowda, N Cheluvarayaswamy, K Venkatesh, HC Mahadevappa, Congress working president Eshwar Khandre and former state Congress president Dinesh Gundu Rao are among those who will take oath on Saturday noon.

Others on the list are Kyathasandra N Rajanna, Sharanabasappa Darshanapur, Shivanand Patil, Ramappa Balappa Timmapur, S S Mallikarjun, Shivaraj Sangappa Tangadagi, Sharanaprakash Rudrappa Patil, Mankal Vaidya, Laxmi Hebbalkar, Rahim Khan, D Sudhakar, Santosh Lad, NS Boseraju, Suresha B S, Madhu Bangarappa, MC Sudhakar and B Nagendra. It is pertinent to mention that the Karnataka government can have 34 ministers. Ten of them, including CM Siddaramaiah and his deputy DK Shivakumar, were sworn in on May 20.

(With inputs from ANI)