Dinesh Gundu Rao appointed working K'taka Congress president

After three days of deliberations in Delhi, the Siddaramaiah-led Congress government in Karnataka appointed Dinesh Gundu Rao as the working state party president.

Meanwhile, Congress MLA Ambareesh tendered his resignation to the Speaker in his chamber, after he was dropped from his post.

The Karnataka Government yesterday removed as many as 14 ministers and inducted 13 others.

The shuffle is being seen as an attempt by the party to hit the refresh button, as the government enters the final lap of its tenure. Karnataka Assembly elections are due in 2018.

Factors such as caste, age, and resource generation were reportedly in play as the Congress chose the new ministers.

The 14 who were removed from the 34-member ministry cried foul, while those who failed to get a berth threatened to quit as legislators.

Educationist M. R. Seetharam, a two-term Congress MLA from Bengaluru who is now a member of the state legislative council, made his maiden foray as a minister.

Former Congress MLA and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Manorama Madhwaraj's son Pramod Madhwaraj, a first-time MLA from Udupi, was among the young faces inducted into the cabinet in place of veteran leaders from the coastal region like Vinay Kumar Sorakke and Abhaychandra Jain.

Among the ministers who were dropped, former MPs V. Srinivas Prasad and M. H. Ambareesh expressed their displeasure.

Prasad, who was the revenue minister accused Siddaramaiah of protecting his coterie of ministers. He also accused Mallikarjun Kharge of choosing his son over loyalists.

Labour minister P. T. Parameshwar Naik from the mining district of Bellary, who was recently in the news for his standoff with police officer Anupama Shenoy, was removed too.

Shivaraj Tangadagi, who was in charge of minor irrigation and was linked to a number of irregularities in the Koppal region, was dropped.

Primary education minister Kimmane Rathnakar, who was under fire after multiple question paper leaks in the course of pre-university exams this year, also lost his berth.