Uncertainty in K'taka Congress after bypolls as high command yet to accept resignations

Bengaluru: With the Congress Karnataka unit president and CLP chief resigning after the debacle in the assembly bypolls, a few senior leaders have started testing the waters on getting appointed to the posts, even as veteran leader Veerappa Moily indicated that the high command was yet to accept the resignations.

Siddaramaiah and Dinesh Gundu Rao had resigned as Congress Legislature party leader and state unit chief respectively owning moral responsibility for the poor show of the party which managed to win only two of the 15 seats that went to the bypolls on December 5.

Asked if the resignations have been accepted by the party high command, senior leader and former union minister Veerappa Moily said that right now everybody was busy with the Parliament session.

“Nothing will happen till then (till the session gets over),” former union minister Veerappa Moily told PTI, indicating that the party high command was yet to accept their resignations.

AICC general secretary K C Venugopal recently said the party’s national president will decide on the next course of action.

On Wednesday, KH Muniyappa, a contender to the post of state congress chief, met former prime minister HD Deve Gowda and had a long discussion with him.

JD(S) sources said they discussed the future course of action in the wake of the resignation by Siddaramaiah and Dinesh Gundu Rao.

Speaking to reporters later, Muniyappa said he called on Gowda to inquire about his health. To a question, he said he was not lobbying for the post.

“There is no need for me to lobby for the post. Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi know it all. It is left to the party high command to decide. We will stick to their decision,” he said.

Other contenders to the post are D K Shivakumar and BK Hariprasad. Amid speculation that HK Patil and KR Ramesh Kumar were in the race for the post of Congress legislature party leader, Kumar, who is Siddaramaiah’s confidant, clarified that he was not in the race.

Stating that Siddaramaiah’s resignation was a matter of conviction and an outcome of collective decision after discussing with him and others, Kumar said joining the race for the post of CLP leader and the leader of the opposition will be an act of treachery.

“How can I be in the race? It will be treachery if I even think of it (to be a CLP leader). It will look as if I managed to ease him out and I am trying to come there.

I don’t belong to that class of politicians. Power is the last item on our agenda,” Kumar said.

Asked if the Congress high command should accept the resignation, Kumar said: “They should accept it. Whether they accept or not, he has given up (the post) taking moral responsibility. Let the party take the right decision…” Kumar added.

HK Patil too has not expressed his wish to take up the post vacated by Siddaramaiah. There had been growing resentment in Congress against Siddaramaiah and Rao, especially by senior leaders

Muniyappa and Hariprasad, over their “unilateral style of functioning” and accountability not being fixed for the party’s debacle in successive polls.