Bengaluru, Nov 29: It was a high drama of a sort when Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar went for a breakfast meeting to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah's residence on Saturday morning.
Apart from the two, only Chief Minister's political advisor Ponnanna was present in the breakfast room, where the two had Idly, Vada, Chutney, Sambar, Upma and Kesari Bath for the menu.
Addressing the media with a smile on his face, Siddaramaiah said that they did not discuss anything over the breakfast table, but had a brief discussion in the next room after the breakfast. Siddaramaiah could not help but admit that the entire meeting drama was scripted by AICC General Secretary K C Venugopal.
Trying to add humour to the situation, Siddaramaiah said: "Shivakumar asked me to come for lunch at his house. I told him that Venugopal had asked me to invite you for breakfast and you better come. I will be going for lunch some other time," he said.
Dodging the media over the power transfer issue, Siddaramaiah went on saying that their meeting was overdue as there were a number of pending administration issues to be discussed. Besides, the party had to be prepared for forthcoming elections to five Corporations coming under Greater Bengaluru Authority and other Municipalities.
Shivakumar added that he even had to discuss a number of State's pending projects, where the MPs had to help the intervention of the Central government. "Our MPs are not taking any responsibilities and we are planning to give them responsibilities of a few projects," he added.
When the journalists insisted upon the power transfer and differences among the two factions of CM and DCM, Siddaramaiah said that the two never had any differences of opinion. "We always worked together under the guidance of the party high command. Neither we had any difference of opinion in the past, nor are we going to have anything in the future.We are working together," he said, adding that all the confusion among the party legislators and leaders will stop from tomorrow.
However, Siddaramaiah was visibly upset when the reporters insisted on 'abiding by the promise,' and said: "When we say that we stand by high command decision, that is the end of the issue. What is abiding by the promise? It is just following a high command order and we both are going to do that," he said.
When a direct question was posed to D K Shivakumar as to what he would do if the promises made to him were not fulfilled, Siddaramaiah intervened and said: "Any promise is direction of the party high command. There will be nothing beyond it," he added.
The post meeting developments dropped enough hints that the two leaders would not be summoned to Delhi soon and any future development on power transfer would be taken only after winter Legislature Session is over in the third week of December.
When asked CM's political advisor Ponnanna if anyone was going to Delhi, he just replied: "Nothing in Delhi. All of us are heading to Belagavi for winter session."
