Eight ministers, including Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar and Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, were sworn in last Saturday following the victory of the Congress in the state in the recently held assembly elections. (File Photo/PTI)
The final list of 24 though has just one woman minister and several senior leaders have failed to make the cut
The much-awaited cabinet expansion of the Congress government in Karnataka will take place on Saturday, with 24 ministers to take oath. With this, Karnataka has got a full cabinet without any vacant seats. The focus has now shifted to portfolio allocation.
There is only one woman minister in the final list and several senior leaders have failed to make it to the list. RV Deshpande, TB Jaya Jayachandra and BK Hariprasad have been left out.
Eight ministers, including Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar and Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, were sworn in last Saturday following the victory of the Congress in the state in the recently held assembly elections.
The party has tried to strike a balance by choosing senior and junior MLAs to the cabinet on the basis of social justice as well as caste and regional representation.
Lingayats have strongly supported the Congress in the elections, with a total of eight ministerial berths given to the community in the full cabinet and representation to almost all major sub-communities. Ishwar Khandre from Banjigas, Lakshmi Hebbalkar and Shivananda Patil from Panchamasli, MB Patil from Kudu Vokkaliga, SS Mallikarjuna from Sadar Lingayat, Sharan Prakash Patil from Adi Banjiga, Darshanapura from Reddy Lingayat and Vaishnav Reddy and HK Patil.
Vokkaligas, another major community that voted for the Congress, got six cabinet berths. Deputy CMs Shivakumar and N Cheluvarayaswamy are from the Gangatkar sect of the Vokkaliga, while Krishna Byregowda from the Dasa Vokkaliga sub-sect and Periyapatna MLA Venkatesh from the Kunchitiga sub-sect have been inducted into the cabinet.
The SC/ST community has got nine berths, including senior leaders like KH Muniyappa, G Parameshwar, HC Mahadevappa, RB Timmapur, and Priyank Kharge.
Two Muslim leaders, Zameer Ahmed Khan and Rahim Khan, are in the cabinet, while KJ George represents the Christian community.
