Bengaluru: Berth pangs continue to plague the new BJP government with Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa taking extra time walking the tight rope in order to keep his cabinet colleagues happy saying portfolios are likely to be allocated to them in a day or two.
Mr Yediyurappa was replying to media persons who quizzed him about allotment of portfolios to new ministers who joined his cabinet on Tuesday. While he has to perform a balancing act while dealing with heavy-weights including former chief minister Jagadish Shettar, former deputy chief minister K.S. Eshwarappa, and former ministers R Ashoka, Govind Karjol, B Sreeramulu, Laxman Savadi, V Somanna, Basavaraj Bommai and S Suresh Kumar, rebels of Congress and JD (S) who brought down the coalition government last month will demand some of the plum portfolios pending a verdict by the Supreme Court against their disqualification.
Sources close to Mr Yediyurappa said the leader, most likely, will retain the finance portfolio while asking senior legislator Govind Karjol to head the home department. Such a move would help win the support of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and help project Mr Karjol as the Dalit face of the state government. All ministers were told to fan out to flood and drought hit parts of Karnataka.
While discussing allotment of portfolios with central leaders, the chief minister has had to contend with discontent brewing within the state unit as many senior legislators demanded top posts to work on strengthen the party's support base in their respective districts. Several unsuccessful ministerial aspirants held discussions on the way forward but decided to convey their displeasure to Mr Yediyurappa tomorrow or on Friday.
