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Bengaluru: At meetings of the Karnataka cabinet, as Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa proposes, Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa disposes.

Three weeks since he was sworn in as CM, Yediyurappa has held four cabinet meetings, and he has been the only minister in attendance at all of them.

Yediyurappa is currently the only minister in Karnataka, with a state cabinet yet to be appointed. The only other participants at these meetings have included the chief secretary and officials of different state government departments.

He made many efforts over the past 22 days to gain an audience with PM Narendra Modi and BJP chief Amit Shah for deliberations about his cabinet.

His two previous visits ended without a meeting because Shah, the Union Home Minister, was busy, first with pushing the triple talaq bill through Parliament and then the abrogation of Article 370. Former CM Jagadish Shettar had also attempted a meeting with Shah a day before Yediyurappa was sworn in on 26 July, but failed to get one.

The CM, meanwhile, is in Delhi again, hopeful that he will finally get the green signal for cabinet expansion. There are 33 ministerial berths to be filled, excluding the chief minister.

Sources in the Yediyurappa government said he will camp in Delhi until the candidates shortlisted for appointment are approved. The expansion is likely to take place on 19 August, they added.

Also read: Delay in Yediyurappa cabinet formation: Is Karnataka not a priority for the BJP?

Waivers and flood relief

As soon as he was sworn in, Yediyurappa held the customary first cabinet meeting on 26 July, in the presence of the chief secretary and other officials.

He took two major decisions at this meeting, to add another Rs 4,000/year for recipients of the PM’s pension scheme for farmers, who are entitled to Rs 6,000/year from the Centre, and a Rs 100 crore loan waiver for the weaver community.

Three days later, on 29 July, after sailing through the trust vote, he held his second cabinet meeting, where he decided to waive loans totalling Rs 60.58 crore given to fishermen in 2017-18 and 2018-19.

Another meeting on 14 August saw him clear three proposals pertaining to development work in his constituency Shivamogga, totalling Rs 1,279 crore. Another important decision taken at this meeting was increasing the compensation for flood-hit families from Rs 3,800 each to Rs 10,000.

‘Not Yediyurappa’s fault’

The fact that the Karnataka cabinet is effectively being run by one person currently has drawn criticism from opposition Congress.

Former Karnataka chief minister Veerappa Moily said not having a cabinet was gross injustice to the democratic system. It only shows the insensitivity of the BJP government, he said.

“When I became the CM (1992), there was a similar situation in Karnataka. There were floods,” he added. “I took over in the afternoon and, the very next day, my government was in place with a full cabinet. I responded on a war footing,” Moily said.

“Be it governance or implementation, there should be a sense of urgency, and the BJP does not seem to have it,” he told The Print.

However, former chief secretary K. Ratna Prabha, now a member of the BJP, said the government machinery was well-oiled. “With the chief minister in the lead, the bureaucratic system ensures that the government is run smoothly,” he added.

“In Telangana, K. Chandrashekar Rao ran his government for months without a cabinet,” he said. “But governance was not at all affected, the same is the case with Karnataka.”

Another former Karnataka chief secretary, J. Alexander, said not having a cabinet could prove troublesome over a long period of time.

“But this is a temporary phase and not due to any mistake on Yediyurappa’s part,” he added. “An average man understands this and even his party bosses have asked him to attend to the floods first. It is not like he has not expanded because he wants to keep all the powers to himself. The delay is because he has been concentrating on flood relief.”

Also read: ‘Leaked tapes’ of Karnataka IPS officer, murky power deal — scandal hits Yediyurappa govt

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