The Janata Dal-Secular demanded that the Congress government should sack Khan from the Cabinet for his racist slur.
Five Congress legislators on Wednesday threatened to resign if senior party leader and minister K H Muniyappa's son-in-law Chikka Peddanna was given a ticket to contest from Kolar in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, bringing into open the divisions in the outfit.
The Congress on Wednesday released a list of 40 leaders who would be the party's star campaigners for the May 10 assembly elections.
A week after assuming power in Karnataka, the Congress on Friday released the list of 24 legislators who will be sworn-in as ministers to fill up all the vacant ministerial positions.
Mallikarjun Kharge, former Congress President Rahul Gandhi, General Secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra attended the swearing in ceremony, while former AICC President Sonia Gandhi was absent. Chief Ministers of Congress ruled states Ashok Gehlot (Rajasthan), Bhupesh Baghel (Chhattisgarh) and Sukhvinder Singh Sukku (Himachal Pradesh) and several top party leaders were also in attendance.
The government has already implemented one of its five poll guarantees, "Shakti", by providing free services for women in public transport buses.
The Karnataka government can have 34 ministers. Ten of them, including Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and his deputy D K Shivakumar, were sworn in on May 20.
Here is a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) analysis of the two aspiring CMs.
Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Monday launched payment of cash in lieu of the additional 5 kg of rice to beneficiaries under the government's 'Anna Bhagya' scheme.
Facing difficulty in procuring large quantities of rice required to fulfil its poll guarantee, the state government on Wednesday decided to pay cash into the beneficiaries' accounts at the rate of Rs 34 per kilo, for the additional 5kg of rice under the free rice scheme.
He said, the fresh budget of the new Congress government, which he will be presenting on July 7, is likely to be of the size Rs 3,35,000 crore.
The Congress seems to be heading for the Karnataka polls so far on the strength of its local leadership and focusing on issues concerning the state, making corruption a central theme of its campaigning.
With this, the Cabinet will reach its full strength of 34.
Both the eight-time MLA Shivakumar and former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah have made no secret of their ambition to become CM and had been involved in a game of political one upmanship in the past.
All eyes are set on the Karnataka cabinet meeting on Friday where a decision will be taken on implementing the five guarantees promised by the ruling Congress during the assembly elections in May.
Multiple challenges, particularly with regard to cabinet formation, stare at Siddaramaiah as he takes over as the new chief minister of Karnataka, nudging out party colleague and state Congress president D K Shivakumar -- who will now be his deputy.
Amid a row over Cauvery water sharing, Karnataka will file a review petition on Tuesday before Cauvery River Authority after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made it clear that only the authority can revisit the decision about the state releasing water to Tamil Nadu.
According to sources in the Congress, eight legislators are likely to be sworn in as ministers along with them.
While Shivakumar is as usual contesting from Kanakapura, Siddaramaiah is returning to his home turf of Varuna in Mysuru district, which is currently represented by his son Dr Yathindra Siddaramaiah.
The Railways on Thursday ordered a high-level inquiry by the commissioner of rail safety into the train accident in Uttar Pradesh, which left 33 people dead and 17 injured.
The loan will be used to finance procurement of electrics for manufacture of EMU rakes, conversion of DC to AC on Central Railway, technical studies and institutional strengthening studies, Minister of State for Railway K H Muniyappa said.
The stations are Secunderabad, Howrah, Sealdah, Kolkata, Chennai Central and Anand Vihar, Minister of State for Railways K H Muniyappa said in a written reply in the Lok Sabha.
Congress leaders and workers from Kolar have been exerting pressure on the Congress legislature party leader to contest from there.
The government on Thursday said steps are being taken to make Railways' centralised enquiry system more user-friendly.
Air-conditioned double decker railway coaches are likely to be introduced into the network during the current financial year.
For the May 10 assembly elections in Karnataka, the following are the 20 seats to watch out for.
The Railways have decided to introduce mobile phone charging facility in sleeper class coaches of every train in a phased manner for passenger benefit, the Lok Sabha was informed on Thursday.
Informing this in the Lok Sabha on Thursday, minister of state for railways K H Muniyappa said trials have been completed on trains and one power car of DMU train has been converted to run on duel fuel mode using CNG and diesel. Earlier, trial run has also been carried out successfully by Northern Railway on engines hauling local trains.
The six-laning of Vadodara-Mumbai section of National Highway No 8 will be taken up at an estimated cost of about Rs 3200 crores (Rs 32 billion), Minister of State for Road Transport K H Muniyappa said in Vadodara on Monday.
The Golden Quadrilateral Road Project, launched in 2000-01 by the National Democratic Alliance government, would be completed by end of December as only five per cent of the work remains to be completed.
The Congress Legislature Party, which met at a private hotel in Bengaluru on Sunday evening, passed a unanimous resolution authorising the party chief to pick its leader.
The Congress leadership has also asked its leaders not to make any public statements on sensitive issues.
'In spirit, and more importantly in its DNA, this is the Congress Inc, or Incorporated, a family-run entity,' notes Saisuresh Sivaswamy.
It was a changed scenario in the new Lok Sabha with the churning brought out by the elections throwing in contrasts.
Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, IT expert Nandan Nilekani and cricketer Mohd Kaif are among 194 candidates as Congress tonight released the first list of its nominees for Lok Sabha polls that contains several new and young faces.
Talk that Anil Kumble, the former Indian captain, will contest the forthcoming Lok Sabha election from Karnataka has been making the rounds. Rediff.com's Vicky Nanjappa finds out if Kumble will indeed spin a political googly.
In the second phase on April 18, 97 seats,spread across 13 states and one Union Territory, will go to the polls.
Despite a poor show, Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah chose not to resign stating that the verdict was a not a referendum on his government. Mahesh Kulkarni reports from Bangalore
In Lok Sabha, the Opposition demanded action against cow vigilantes.
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