Bengaluru, Jan 17: In a race against time for consolidating his position to ascend to the coveted Chief Minister's post, Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka D K Shivakumar has cancelled his participation in the World Economic Forum at Davos, scheduled to begin from Jan 18.
Sudden Bidar trip
Shivakumar, who was in Delhi since Friday, made a dash to Bidar in Karnataka to pay homage to departed senior Congress leader and former Minister Bhimanna Khandre. He then returned to Delhi immediately.
However, Shivakumar has said that the cancellation was due to his official engagements in New Delhi and Bengaluru.
Party and campaign duties
While there were a series of meetings with AICC functionaries regarding Assam Assembly elections, there were a lot of preparations for the party's ongoing campaign against the Union Government's decision to scrap MNREGA and replace it with `G-RAM-G'. Karnataka is also holding a five day special Legislature Session from January 22, where his presence was necessary, Shivakumar said.
However, things are not as simple as they appear. After the November deadline for transferring power to Shivakumar lost steam, he was hell bent on getting a proper commitment from the party high command. Meanwhile, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has made it clear that he would step down only if Rahul Gandhi says. But, Rahul has been evasive and non committal on the issue, as he did not want to antagonize an OBC leader at this juncture, especially where there is general elections to five states.
Rahul Gandhi factor
Last week, when Rahul Gandhi was on his way to Nilgiri district to participate in a school day function, both Siddaramaiah and D K Shivakumar were in Mysuru. Interestingly, on the same day, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz was in Bengaluru, as part of his tour to India. While the Industries Minister M B Patil made all the business talks with Merz, the two leaders were in Mysuru, waiting for Rahul Gandhi.
Though Rahul Gandhi could not talk to both during onward journey, while returning, he spoke to both Siddaramaiah and D K Shivakumar separately. While he asked Siddaramaiah to wait for his call before reshuffling the cabinet, he assured that he would talk to him in Delhi during his visit on Jan 16.
While D K Shivakumar met Rahul Gandhi for a brief period between the meetings, Siddaramaiah had silently dispatched Energy Minister K J George to Delhi, who also held a meeting with Rahul Gandhi after Shivakumar meetings.
Parallel outreach
Though no one knows the exact details of what transpired during these two meetings, one thing is sure that Shivakumar has not got a proper commitment from Rahul Gandhi yet.If he leaves Delhi to Davos without proper commitment, he has to return to Bengaluru by Jan 22.
Since it is a do or die situation for Shivakumar, he has decided to forgo Davos meeting and wait in Delhi for a meeting with Rahul Gandhi to get a proper commitment.
