Congress working president for north Karnataka and a senior lingayat leader SR Patil has tendered his resignation over the party’s “unsatisfactory performance” in the recent Assembly elections.
Patil who played a major role in north Karnataka as a lingayat leader has said he resigned over party’s poor performance. He said “I have sent my resignation to Rahul Gandhiji through an email some days back after taking up moral responsibility for the party’s unsatisfactory performance in Assembly elections. Had my party won more seats from North Karnataka, we would have formed the Government on our own.” The party high command is yet to respond to Patil’s resignation.
On media reports that former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah was lobbying to make him the KPCC President after Parameshwara was appointed as the Deputy Chief Minister, Patil said he would be happy to accept any role the party gives. “I will not leave Congress for any reason,” he said. However speculation is ripe in political circles about SR Patil’s resignation and the BJP which is still coming to terms about its defeat was quick to react and said the crumbling of the empire which was built against peoples’ mandate.
“The downfall of the empire that was built after mocking people’s mandate has begun. @INCKarnataka senior leader Sri. S R Patil resigns. This is only the beginning of the downfall of power hungry Government,” BJP Karnataka said on its twitter handle.
Patil (69) had been the Minister in the previous congress Government led by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah. He served as the Minister for Infrastructure, information technology, biotechnology, science and technology, planning and statistics in the State Government.
Congress has lost many seats to BJP in the northern Karnataka where lingayat did not support them. The Congress won just 8 seats in Belagavi, 2 in Bagalkot, 3 in Vijayapura, 1 in Gadag and 2 in Dharwad, districts. SR Patil resigned at the time when Congress is thinking about deputing senior leaders who were Minsters in the previous Government to the party work.
Congress has joined with JDs in Karnataka as part of its strategy to unite minor parties across the country to fight the BJP, Amit Shah and Modi. The swearing in ceremony of HD Kumaraswamy as the full time Chief Minister for the five years has witnessed a galaxy of Opposition leaders in Bengaluru to form a platform to fight BJP in 2019 elections.
JDS and Congress had stitched up a post-poll alliance at the State level after the recent Assembly polls yielded a fractured mandate with BJP emerging as the single largest party with 104 members, falling short of the required numbers. Kumaraswamy was sworn in as Chief Minister on May 23. Two days later on May 25, he proved the majority on the floor of the Assembly. The BJP had conceded the numbers game with B S Yeddyurappa resigning on May 19 without facing the trust vote.
Kumaraswamy will expand his Cabinet on Wednesday and will share 22 cabinet births with the Congress and JDs will have 12 births. Both the parties are struggling with lot of aspirants vying for plum posts with permutation and combination of caste and other parameters.