'Shivakumar, Siddaramaiah Won't Sabotage One Another'

'Both men understand the stakes.'
'Getting back into power, for an Opposition party in the current national climate -- with One Nation One Election on the horizon, and the full weight of the BJP machinery bearing down -- is extraordinarily difficult.'
'They are not about to squander what they have.'

When the Congress swept back to power in Karnataka in May 2023, winning 135 of the 224 assembly seats, the state had two claimants to the chief minister's chair and only one chair to offer.

The high command resolved the impasse by installing the veteran socialist Siddaramaiah -- then 75 years old, a two-time CM and the party's most recognisable AHINDA face -- and making D K Shivakumar, the party's state unit president and the man credited with engineering that electoral victory, his deputy.

A power-sharing arrangement, widely rumoured but never formally acknowledged, was said to have been struck: Two-and-a-half years each.

For the better part of three years, that arrangement simmered uneasily. Siddaramaiah held firm, publicly insisting at one point that he would serve the full five-year term. Shivakumar bided his time, making increasingly frequent trips to Delhi.

Then, in the last week of May, the high command finally moved: Marathon negotiations in New Delhi, a closed-door session between Rahul Gandhi and Siddaramaiah, and it was done.

Siddaramaiah tendered his resignation on May 28. The Congress Legislature Party elected Shivakumar its leader unanimously the following day, with Siddaramaiah himself proposing the name. The swearing-in is scheduled for June 3, 2026.

Columnist and activist Shivasundar -- who writes a weekly column in the Kannada daily newspaper Vartha Bharathi and contributes regularly to The Wire, The News Minute and Sabrang -- spoke to Prasanna D Zore/Rediff about what the transition really means for Karnataka and what lies ahead even if the long tussle between Siddaramaiah and D K Shivakumar is finally settled.

The first of a two-part must-read interview:

'The most consequential immediate challenge will be what he chooses to do with'

How different will D K Shivakumar's style of governance be from Siddaramaiah's? What are the significant changes Karnataka is likely to witness under his stewardship?

We did not have an unblemished record even during the Siddaramaiah government, to be candid. The Adani tunnel road project worth over Rs 19,000 crores -- an entirely unnecessary undertaking -- and the Greater Bangalore Authority, recently constituted, are both essentially D K Shivakumar's brainchildren that came to fruition during the previous government itself.

So what was until now pro-corporate and dominant caste in orientation -- somewhat subterranean, operating as an undercurrent -- will come fully to the surface under Shivakumar.

He is, by the way, taking the oath on Wednesday at 4.05 in the afternoon -- a time fixed by his personal astrologer, in whom he places considerable confidence. These are not things he conceals.

You would also recall that Shivakumar once, during an assembly session, described Manusmriti as an RSS anthem -- but in the same breath said he had attended RSS gatherings himself, and indeed is on record stating that Manusmriti is a great repository of Indian culture.

He has also said, quite openly, that Indian women require the protection of Indian men because they are inherently gullible. These are the cultural values he represents. He is deeply superstitious, and he does not feel any need to hide it.

His personal history is that of a street-fighter, to put it plainly -- though he has since reinvented himself as a corporate figure with extensive business interests.

When he was asked, a month into the current government in 2023, about the steel flyover project in central Bengaluru -- the one against which there had been a major citizens' protest, and which Siddaramaiah had eventually been compelled to withdraw -- Shivakumar's reply was blunt: Had he been chief minister, he said, he would have bulldozed that resistance and built the flyover.

So what we are looking at, broadly, is a more corporate, upper caste, authoritarian, and superstition-friendly dispensation under D K Shivakumar?

Yes, broadly. Though we must also be clear that he will not have a completely free hand. He remains a political creature, and the constraints of politics will apply.

The most consequential immediate challenge will be what he chooses to do with the Madhusudan Rai Commission report -- the second social survey commissioned after the Backward Classes Commission report was accepted and subsequently shelved (the social survey -- Karnataka's second attempt at a comprehensive caste enumeration, ordered by Siddaramaiah and submitted just days before his resignation -- recommends raising OBC reservation from 32 to 51 per cent).

That report has its own set of complications and simmering tensions, but it will eventually have to come before the cabinet.

'The real threat to him is H D Kumaraswamy'

Will Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar be able to work together, or is there a danger of rivalry? Siddaramaiah will presumably want his policy initiatives completed, while Shivakumar will want to stamp his own authority on governance.

The guarantee schemes -- the five electoral promises that brought Congress to power -- will continue. There is no question of those being touched.

There are Greater Bangalore Authority elections and local body elections coming up, and you are looking at one year of governance followed by one year of electioneering. That pressure binds all factions of the Congress government together, whatever their individual calculations.

They are compelled to cooperate, at least to a degree -- though they will simultaneously be serving their own factional interests.

And let us be honest: There is no distinct 'Siddaramaiah project' beyond the guarantees. The guarantees were a Congress project, and Shivakumar will continue them -- he cannot afford to do otherwise, given the electoral calendar ahead.

On most other matters, the approach thus far has been by consensus. The question mark remains the social survey report -- that one may well be quietly pushed to the back burner. It would not surprise anyone if it ended up in court, with someone conveniently filing a petition, particularly since the national census remains pending and this was a survey rather than a census, with no legal compulsion on citizens to participate. In fact, a significant portion of the population did not.

What is the biggest challenge Shivakumar faces in transforming himself from a corporate political into a chief minister with mass appeal?

He will not attempt that transformation -- there is no compulsion for it.

After forty years in politics conducted entirely on his own terms, he had become the deputy chief minister. He is an exceptionally strong local leader, deeply rooted in the Vokkaliga belt and the Old Mysuru region.

The real threat to him is H D Kumaraswamy, because the traditional Vokkaliga base has long been contested between the Congress and the JD-S (Janata Dal-Secular).

Vokkaligas constitute over eleven per cent of the state's population -- a substantial enough constituency to anchor his (Shivakumar) position without requiring him to reinvent himself.

The Congress is, ultimately, a coalition of caste blocs. Satish Jarkiholi -- who is on reasonably good terms with Shivakumar at the moment -- is likely to become the new KPCC president once Shivakumar vacates that post on assuming office.

What you will see is a coalition of regional leaders -- a section from Dalits, a section from the ST communities -- who will not sabotage the government, but who will certainly extract their pound of flesh. Cabinet berths, at the very least.

DKS never had socialist inclination unlike Siddharamaiah. Even Siddharamaiah was a neo-liberal CM strictly following neo-liberal fiscal discipline.

• PART 2 of the Interview: 'Shivakumar, Siddaramaiah Won't Sabotage One Another'