Karnataka's lone woman minister Karandlaje resigns

A day after dissident leaders dropped their demand for the removal of Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa, Shobha Karandlaje, the lone woman minister in Karnataka’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government, resigned today.

With this, two of out of the six main demands put forth by the Reddy brothers have been met by the chief minister.

The resignation of 44-year-old Karandlaje came within hours of Yeddyurappa dismissing as “speculation” that the rural development and panchayati raj minister would be dropped, as sought by rebels led by Tourism Minister G Janardhana Reddy.

“It has not been decided who are the ministers to be dropped from the ministry. All these issues would be discussed at the core committee meeting,” Yeddyurappa told reporters.

The setting up of a core committee and a coordination committee was part of the compromise formula hammered out by the BJP central leadership to please the dissidents to allow Yeddyurappa continue as the chief minister.

Karandlaje, who joined the BJP after being in the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), is considered close to Yeddyurappa. Disside nts had accused her of behaving like a second CM because of her proximity to Yeddyurappa. She was also charged with interfering in the functioning of other ministries.

Karandlaje was born near Puttur in the coastal Dakshina Kannada district, about 300 km from here.

She was active in the BJP’s student wing Akhila Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishath, Mahila Morcha (women’s wing) and was also the general secretary of the state BJP unit.

Karandlaje is not married and devotes full time to BJP. She was elected to the Vidhana Parishat (legislative council) in June 2004 for the first time. As she rose in the party ranks, controversies surrounded her, mainly around her closeness to Yeddyurappa.

Ignoring opposition within the party, Yeddyurappa picked her up to fight the May 2008 assembly elections from Yeswanthpur in Bangalore north. She beat her detractors and won the seat though a section of BJP workers did not canvass for her saying she was an ‘outsider’ as she hailed from Dakshina Kannada.

Meanwhile, legislators who had been camping at a resort in Hyderabad for the past week, have started returning to the state capital.