Karnataka CM flies to Delhi to discuss cabinet expansion

Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai left for Delhi on Sunday to hold consultations with the Bharatiya Janata Party central leadership on expansion of his cabinet.

"Most probably there is a meeting tomorrow. I will meet our party president J P Nadda," Bommai told reporters before leaving for the national capital by a flight.

Earlier in the day, he said the cabinet expansion exercise may not take a week's time and a direction from the leadership was likely by Monday.

Bommai took oath as the Chief Minister on July 28 after the resignation of his predecessor B S Yediyurappa on July 26.

He is the lone Cabinet member in the government.

Meanwhile, many ministerial aspirants called on Bommai and raised the pitch for a cabinet berth.

Former agriculture minister B C Patil, who met Bommai, maintained that his meeting was related to an irrigation project in his constituency.

Asked whether he spoke to the CM about a ministerial berth, he said, "The CM is aware of it. He has already spoken about it (cabinet expansion) to the media that he will do it at the earliest. So I did not discuss with him on this issue."

Patil also took exception to terms like 'outsiders' and 'Bombay Boys' used to describe the 17 MLAs, who broke away from the Congress and the Janata Dal-Secular to topple the coalition government led by H D Kumaraswamy in 2019, were disqualified from the Assembly and later joined the BJP.

Of them, a majority of MLAs won the bypolls and 11 were made ministers.

Those who quit Congress and the JD-S have been demanding a ministerial berth, saying their 'sacrifice' in 2019 had helped install the BJP government in Karnataka.

Besides Patil, Murugesh Nirani, Shivanagouda Naik, Mahesh Kumathalli, K G Bopaiah, Dr C N Ashwath Narayan and V Somanna were among those who called on the Chief Minister on Sunday, party sources said.