Siddaramaiah denies rift with Shivakumar as both leaders reach Delhi to meet Rahul Gandhi

On Tuesday, Karnataka Congress president DK Shivakumar and former CM Siddaramaiah reached the national capital to meet Wayanad MP Rahul Gandhi. Both of them have been separately called for a meeting with the ex-Congress chief at around 4 pm. Speaking to the media, Siddaramaiah dismissed speculation about the rift in the Karnataka unit of Congress. Maintaining that he had no problems with Shivakumar, he exuded confidence in Congress coming back to power in the state. 

Former Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah remarked, "There is no conflict between me and DK Shivakumar. We are together. We are together building the party. Congress party will come back to power in Karnataka. Why will there be any rift in Congress? We are in opposition. We are fighting against the corruption of the BJP government." 

On this occasion, he also hinted that the BJP high command has decided to sack BS Yediyurappa as the Chief Minister of Karnataka. The senior Congress leader asserted, "As per my information, the high command has taken a decision to change him. And he is the most corrupt CM Karnataka ever had. Yediyurappa should go and BJP should also go because all the Ministers in the Cabinet of Yediyurappa are all corrupt". 

Rift over CM face

The meeting with Rahul Gandhi comes at a juncture comes amid a tussle in Karnataka Congress over the CM candidate. For instance, the Karnataka Congress' official Twitter handle posted in May that the COVID-19 pandemic would have been in control had Shivakumar been the Chief Minister. However, this tweet was deleted thereafter without any explanation giving rise to the speculation that the Siddaramaiah camp is miffed. 

Recently, Congress MLAs Zameer Ahmed Khan and Raghavendra Hitnal publicly projected Siddaramaiah as the next Chief Minister of the state. Warning these leaders on June 22 for commenting on the leadership issue, Disciplinary Committee Chairman Rahman Khan affirmed that making statements in favour of one leader does not serve the purpose of Congress when it is in the opposition. But, this failed to make an impact as two more legislators- JN Ganesh and Bhima Naik also favoured Siddaramaiah.

Clearing the air over the issue, Shivakumar clarified that he was in no hurry to occupy the top post. Addressing the media on June 23, the former Minister stressed that his sole agenda was to bring the Congress party back to power in the state. The Sonia Gandhi-led party was a part of the government led by HD Kumaraswamy until July 23, 2019.