PTI
Bengaluru
Amid speculation that he will step down, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah is likely to host a crucial breakfast meeting for his cabinet colleagues on Thursday morning, official sources said.
The urgency of the situation was highlighted by a last-minute change to Deputy CM D K Shivakumar’s tour plan. Initially scheduled to return to Bengaluru this afternoon, Shivakumar revised his tour plan to leave Delhi early Thursday morning to attend the breakfast meeting at the CM’s official residence here.
Speculation is mounting that Siddaramaiah will announce his resignation from the CM’s post in a couple of days, mostly on Thursday, to clear the path for Shivakumar.
The development follows the Congress high command reportedly requesting a leadership change in the state and offering Siddaramaiah a central role in the party along with a Rajya Sabha seat.
As per reports, Siddaramaiah has not immediately accepted the central role.
According to sources, Siddaramaiah might have resolved to step down as the message came directly from Rahul Gandhi.
The CM had been repeatedly saying that he would exit if asked by the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha.
However, the Congress on Tuesday termed as “mere speculation” the talk about any leadership change in Karnataka and asserted that the day-long discussions between the central and state top brass were solely focused on the upcoming elections to the Rajya Sabha and the state legislative council.
Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar were summoned to Delhi on Tuesday by the party, where there were back-to-back meetings at the Congress headquarters involving Rahul Gandhi, AICC President Mallikarjun Kharge, party General Secretaries K C Venugopal and Randeep Singh Surjewala.
Meanwhile, Siddaramaiah and some of his cabinet colleagues, who had accompanied him to Delhi, returned to Bengaluru late last night.
He held closed-door meetings with Ministers even after arriving here, as per reports.
The CM is scheduled to attend an event on Wednesday to mark the death anniversary of Jawaharlal Nehru at the state Congress office and will later pay tributes to the first Prime Minister’s statue at Vidhana Soudha. He has no other official engagements for the rest of the day, as per his schedule.
There are also reports that Venugopal and Surjewala will arrive in Bengaluru soon.
Supporters of Shivakumar have been insisting on his elevation in line with a reported power-sharing agreement with Chief Minister Siddaramaiah when the party won the 2023 Assembly elections.
The leadership tussle within the ruling party had intensified amid speculation about a possible change of chief minister after the Congress government completed the halfway mark of its five-year term on November 20, 2025.
There was stiff competition between Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar, who is also party state president, for the chief minister’s post after the declaration of Assembly election results in May 2023, and the Congress had then managed to convince the latter and made him the Deputy CM.
There were reports at the time that a compromise had been reached based on a “rotational chief minister formula,” according to which Shivakumar will become CM after two-and-half years, but they have not been officially confirmed by the party.
