Bengaluru: Wary of getting on the wrong side of Governor Vajubhai Vala on the issue of nominating three members to the Legislative Council, leaders of the ruling Congress have decided to adopt a new strategy to make sure that names sent to Raj Bhavan are not rejected.
These nominations are long overdue but central leaders of Congress have not cleared the final list because of pressure from state unit leaders to get their supporters into the upper House. Chief Minister Siddaramaiah reminded party president Sonia Gandhi and other leaders during his visit to New Delhi soon after the ruling party's victory in Nanjangud and Gundlupet.
Meanwhile, to avoid a re-run of the stand-off between Mr Vala and the state government last year, Congress leaders have decided to employ a novel method to ensure a quick approval by Raj Bhavan of three names under artistes' and writers' category. The names which are doing the rounds for three seats include Mohan Kumar Kondajji, P.R. Ramesh and C.M.Lingappa and K.P. Nanjundi. Interestingly, none of them are eligible to make it to this category. Therefore, fearing rejection of the list, the government reportedly decided to send law and parliamentary affairs minister, T.B. Jayachandra, to meet and convince Mr Vala about the need to need to clear the list. Once they are convinced of Mr Vala's stand, then the list would be forward to Raj Bhavan, Congress sources said.
Meanwhile, supporters of Mr Nanjundi, a close associate of a senior AICC general secretary from Karnataka, expressed displeasure over likely deletion of their leader's name. They set fire to a tyre as a mark of protest.
The previous BJP government faced similar situation when then Governor H.R.Bhardwaj rejected the nomination of former minister V Somanna under the category "persons of eminence" to the Council.
