Ramalinga Reddy took two days to feel the pangs of his conscience. He was sworn in as irrigation minister in the D.K. Shivakumar cabinet on a Wednesday. On Friday, he told the press that he was “resigning from my post because I cannot work against conscience”. Don’t know what sort of sinful irrigation practice he was asked to do that hurt his conscience.
Too quick a quit act, you say? No way. That record, for the shortest ministerial stint, goes to fellow-Kannadiga R.L. Jalappa. His first minister job at the Centre lasted about three quarters of an hour.
Jalappa was sworn in as a minister of state in the Deve Gowda government in 1996. He took the oath, signed the book, curtsied to the president, walked back to his seat, took out a sheet of paper from his pocket and scribbled his resignation on it. This columnist was witness to the whole drama along with several other scribes who were covering the swearing-in.
To be fair, he didn’t mar the sanctity of the ceremony by walking out in the middle of it. He waited till everyone else in the team took oath, stood up for the national anthem, secret-passed the note to Gowda, and left the hall without joining the team for tea. The incident created only a storm in the teacup. Gowda gave him a cabinet job a few days later.
Yashwant Sinha was less smart. He drove to the Rashtrapati Bhavan hoping to get a cabinet job in the V.P. Singh team of 1990. Only a few steps away from the Durbar Hall, now called the Ganatantra Mandap, did he open the cabinet secretary’s letter that said he was to be an MoS. Blame him not. The letter was handed over to him only at the presidential palace gates. In two seconds he turned around and drove home. That’s what you call thinking on the feet.
Sinha had to stay in the cold longer than Jalappa—till Chandra Shekhar, who succeeded VP a year later, inducted him with cabinet rank.
Back to Bengaluru. Reddy, who had held minister jobs in three cabinets, is cut up over his portfolio. He wanted Bengaluru urban development, but was given irrigation. Bred in and elected from Bengaluru eight times, the city slicker thinks he is better cut out for urban affairs than wetting peasants’ paddies in the countryside. He had asked for the town job three years ago and had thrown tantrums when tasked with irrigation in the Siddaramaiah team. I’ll be CM one day, and I’ll give you the job you want—DKS, whom Sidda sent to smooth-talk to Reddy, had promised then.
Anyway, the party has smooth-talked him. He will stay for now. And DKS has promised to address his grouse.
Having managed the Karnataka transition well, the Congress has fouled up the aftermath. Another eighth time-winner K.H. Muniyappa is miffed that he didn’t get the deputy CM job (it went to another veteran, G. Parameshwara) nor the social welfare or farms ministries that he had coveted. Instead he was asked to handle food and civil supplies, which he had handled under Sidda. Yet another veteran, K.J. George, who handled energy under Sidda, too is keen on a change. Hopefully, things should sort out soon. A cabinet expansion is expected after the Rajya Sabha polls on June 18. Till then it will be ceasefire.
Looks like Sidda is going to be the elephant in the room for DKS. Literally so! He is keeping the CM’s mansion, has spurned all offers of a cushy Rajya Sabha job in Delhi, and is hanging about in Bengaluru giving sleepless nights to DKS. More than half a dozen of Sidda’s men are in the first batch of 14 DKS ministers.
Like the godfather Vito Corleone, can the high command offer him something he can’t refuse?
prasannan@theweek.in
