Portfolios: Same ministers back

Jul 16, 2012 |

Bengaluru

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Chief Minister Jagadish Shettar can finally breathe easy with the ruling BJP completing the vexed task of allocating portfolios to all 34 ministers including the chief minister and no rumblings emerging from the cabinet till now.

Though the new cabinet was sworn in on Thursday, portfolio allocation did not happen with deputy CM K.S. Eshwarappa angling for the all important finance portfolio while the second Dy CM, R. Ashok wanted to retain home and transport.

Mr Ashok and all his colleagues in the Sadananda Gowda cabinet, have reason to be happy as they have been allowed to retain their portfolios without any change with the Chief Minister restricting himself to allocating portfolios to the newly inducted 13 ministers.

As for Mr Eshwarappa, he will have to be content with the revenue ministry, a portfolio handled by Karunakar Reddy, who is now busy organising BJP MLAs left out of the ministry.

The final list of portfolios, which has been approved by Governor H.R. Bhardwaj, was made public after Mr Shettar held consultations with senior leaders in New Delhi. Some minor changes were made with food and civil supplies, previously held by Shobha Karandlaje, given to D.N. Jeevaraj, while Ms Karandlaje will continue to hold the crucial energy department.

Unlike his predecessor Sadananda Gowda, who juggled as many as 21 portfolios after a spree of resignations, Mr Shettar will handle his previous portfolio, rural development and panchayat raj and take over finance and Intelligence.

Party insiders said there was heavy lobbying for departments like RDPR, women and child development, PWD, health and family welfare and minor irrigation as they have huge budgets and are ‘visible’ departments where the work done by the minister has an impact on the common man. The mad rush for such portfolios is also because it is an election year and good work might just translate into votes too.

On the other hand, there are few takers for departments like Kannada and culture, planning and statistics, which have small budget allocations. As one of the ministers put it, it is difficult to be in the public eye with a small portfolio.

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