Congress-JD-S panel okays Karnataka cabinet expansion soon

Karnataka would expand cabinet in September third week and appoint heads of boards and corporations soon, said senior Congress leader Siddaramaiah on Friday.

"Congress President Rahul Gandhi has agreed to the cabinet expansion in September third week and the appointment of chairmen of boards and corporations across the state," Siddaramaiah told reporters here.

The decision to expand the cabinet was taken at the meeting of the 5-member coalition coordination and monitoring committee of the alliance partners.

With Siddaramaiah as the committee's chairman, Chief Minister H.D Kumaraswamy, Deputy Chief Minister G. Parameshwara and Congress general secretary and the party's state unit in-charge K.C. Venugopal are the other members.

JD-S general secretary Danish Ali is the convenor of the panel.

"The Congress has six ministerial berths to induct while the JD-S has one post to fill in the 34-member state cabinet," said Siddaramaiah.

Kumaraswamy met Gandhi in New Delhi on Thursday and urged him to allow his party's state unit to expand the cabinet as elections to the urban local bodies across the state was held on Friday.

"The committee has agreed to appoint chairpersons to 30 boards and corporations, with 20 of them from the Congress and 10 from the JD-S," said the former Congress Chief Minster.

As all the party's newly elected legislators cannot be made ministers due to the ceiling, Siddaramaiah said some of them would be made chairmen of the state-runs boards and corporations.

"Ad hoc or arbitrary" transfer of officials, including IAS and IPS officers within in the first 100 days of the post-poll alliance government also figured prominently in the 2-hour long third meeting of the panel.

"We have told the chief minister to ensure the polices and programmes of the previous Congress government be continued in this fiscal as it's a coalition partner in the state government," added Siddaramaiah.

--IANS

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