Siddaramaiah Leaves For Delhi Alone, Shivakumar Undecided

A day after Karnataka Congress passed a unanimous resolution authorising the party's National President Mallikarjun Kharge to pick the next Chief Minister, Siddaramaiah left for New Delhi on Monday to meet the party's central leadership.

There were earlier reports that Siddaramaiah and DK Shivakumar, who are frontrunners for the top post, would be in Delhi to meet the national leaders on Monday.

However, Siddaramaiah alone has gone to Delhi now. On his turn, DK Shivakumar said that has not decided whether to go to the national capital or not.

On Sunday evening, the Congress Legislature Party (CLP), which met at a private hotel in Bengaluru, passed a unanimous resolution authorising Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge to pick its leader. It was attended by AICC General Secretary KC Venugopal and three central observers (Sushil Kumar Shinde, Deepak Babaria, and Jitendra Singh Alwar), who will leave for Delhi at 10 am today.

"The Congress Legislature Party unanimously resolves that the AICC President is hereby authorised to appoint the new Leader of the Congress Legislature Party," according to a one-line resolution passed at the CLP meeting.

AICC in-charge of Karnataka Randeep Singh Surjewala has said that Mallikarjun Kharge will not take long to announce the name of the next Chief Minister of Karnataka.

"Party leadership will take a decision. I can't replace my judgement with Kharge Sahab's judgement. He is our senior, and as you all know him. He is the son of the soil of Karnataka, and I'm sure he will not take very long," he said while speaking to reporters after a late-night meeting with the newly-elected Congress leaders. "The winning party will be in the first cabinet when we will implement our first five guarantees," he added.

In the Karnataka Assembly elections held last week, Congress registered a resounding win, winning 135 seats while the ruling BJP managed to bag just 66. The JDS was reduced to 19 in the 224-member Assembly.