Karnataka Congress gets two more working presidents

Bengaluru: BTM Layout MLA Ramalinga Reddy and Dhruvanarayana, who had lost the Chamarajanagar Assembly election to BJP’s Sreenivasa Prasad were sworn-in as party working presidents on February 20. With their elevation, the number of working presidents in Congress has increased to five.

Reports reveal the party’s social engineering strategy in action as Satish Jarkiholi represents the ST category, Eshwar Khandre represents the Lingayats, Saleem Ahmed the minorities, Ramalinga Reddy the Vokkaligas and Dhruvanarayana the SC Right.

As Ramalinga Reddy comes from a larger Vokkaliga community, there was opposition from sections of the party when his name was proposed.

As Rajya Sabha opposition leader Mallikarjun Kharge and former KPCC president Dr. G Parameshwara are SC Right, there have been murmurs with the SC Left that they don’t have sufficient representation.

Edigas constitute 4-5% of the population and are concentrated in Dakshina Kannada, Uttara Kannada, Udupi, and Shivamogga districts. There is pressure from this community to appoint one of their leaders as working president of Congress.

Reports reveal that the Gollas (cowherds), Bestas (fisherman), and other communities have been seeking representation in the party.

In order to convince the Congress central leadership about the need to galvanize the backward communities under the Congress umbrella, Former CM and Congress Legislature Party leader Siddaramaiah visited Delhi recently.

This lead to a party march in Dakshina Kannada on February 22. The aim of this march is to bring the backward classes under Congress’s influence and to win back the district and coastal areas that are with BJP.