Upset ministers in Karnataka force CM to reshuffle portfolios

Under pressure from his own party men, Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa changed portfolios of new cabinet ministers within 24 hours of their appointment.

J C Madhuswamy has been assigned the Haj and Wakf department instead of Kannada and Culture. Aravind Limbavali, who was allotted the forest department, will also look after Kannada and Culture.

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MTB Nagaraja, who didn’t want the excise ministry, will now look after the Municipal Administration Department and the Sugarcane Development and Directorate of Sugar.

The excise department will now be handled by K Gopalaiah, who was earlier assigned Horticulture and Sugarcane Development.

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R Shankar will now look after Horticulture instead of the Municipal Administration Department.

K C Narayana Gowda will be in-charge of Planning, Programme Monitoring and Statistics Department instead of Haj and Wakf.

Several of Yediyurappa’s new ministers, including Nagaraja, Gopalaiah and Madhuswamy, were very vocal in expressing their discontent about the portfolios assigned to them. Madhuswamy is the only minister in the new cabinet who is originally from the BJP. The rest are turncoats who were expecting rewards for helping Yediyurappa return as the chief minister in 2019.

Seeing largescale discontent, Yediyurappa held several meetings to pacify the upset ministers.

After the portfolios were reassigned, Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai said: “Everything is resolved now. All are happy.”