Siddaramaiah meets Sonia, Rahul for cabinet expansion talks

Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Friday met Congress parliamentary party (CPP) chairperson Sonia Gandhi and former party chief Rahul Gandhi at their residence in New Delhi.

Siddaramaiah is in the national capital to discuss matters related to the expansion of his Cabinet and this is his first meeting with Sonia Gandhi after the Congress formed government in the southern state.

The Karnataka chief minister is learnt to have assured the CPP chairperson of good governance in the state and also thank her for her guidance and campaigning during the assembly elections. 

Top Congress leaders on Thursday had held discussions with Siddaramaiah and his deputy D K Shivakumar over expansion of the state Cabinet.

The leaders had met Congress general secretary in-charge for Karnataka Randeep Surjewala, party general secretary organisation K C Venugopal and Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge.

Sources had said around 20 more ministers are likely to be inducted in the Karnataka Cabinet and added that another round of discussions will be held before the it is finalised.

Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar were sworn in as chief minister and deputy chief minister respectively along with eight cabinet ministers on May 20.      

The Congress high command had approved the first list of eight ministers against the earlier plan of inducting a much higher number of around 28 legislators into the Cabinet.

Karnataka can have a maximum of 34 ministers and the Congress will find it difficult to accommodate all the aspirants. 

Sources said the names of only those MLAs were cleared who represented all sections and were senior-most, and there were no objections from any side over the choice.

Differences between Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar are emerging over names of probable ministers with both pushing the case of MLAs close to them.