'There's a dead rat on your plate': BJP slams Cong on additional deputy CM rumours in Karnataka

Union minister Pralhad Joshi hit out at the Siddaramaiah regime on Sunday, saying the CM was tacitly backing the voices advocating more deputies so undercut deputy CM DK Shivakumar's influence. The administration, he said, had collapsed in the two leaders’ fight.

“[This] has been well planned by CM Siddaramaiah. It is an internal fight between both of them,” he said.

He also slammed the Congress for blaming the opposition BJP for the dispute. “It's very strange that one of their ministers is saying that the BJP has its hand behind this. How immature one must be to say such a thing. There's a dead rat on your plate, and you are talking about the BJP. This is utter nonsense,” he said.

The speculation around increasing the number of deputy CM posts had flared up weeks after the general election, with cooperation minister KN Rajanna, public works minister Satish Jarkiholi and minority affairs minister BZ Zameer Ahmed Khan saying on various platforms that community-wise posts of deputy CM would help the party electorally, especially after the loss in the recent Lok Sabha polls. While leaders in the party had floated the suggestion before the polls, the idea had then been dismissed.

The demand for increasing the number of deputy CMs – mostly from ministers in Siddaramaiah’s camp – has fuelled speculation that he wants to keep his Vokkaliga deputy Shivakumar in check, amid rumours that the latter might seek the CM post for himself. Shivakumar has been the only deputy CM in the Karnataka government after the AICC resolved a tough contest between him and Siddaramaiah for the CM’s post when the party won the assembly polls last year.

Shivakumar on Saturday said there was no demand for additional deputy CMs and claimed some people just wanted publicity. “All of this is a media creation. Some people just wanted to have their names circulated in the news. That's it,” he said.