BENGALURU:
Senior Congress leader RV Deshpande will be the pro-tem Speaker of the Karnataka Legislative Assembly for the session that has been called next week.
The first Karnataka Legislative Assembly session, after the formation of the new government will be held on starting Monday next week in Bengaluru. The session will be held for three days – Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.
Senior Congress leader RV Deshpande will be the pro-tem Speaker of the Karnataka Legislative Assembly for the session that has been called next week. Congress leader Siddaramaiah was sworn in as the Chief Minister of Karnataka for the second time on Saturday after the party’s thumping victory in the Assembly elections.
DK Shivakumar was sworn in as the Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka. Eight Congress MLAs were also sworn in as ministers in the Karnataka Cabinet during the oath-taking ceremony in Bengaluru. Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge’s son Priyank Kharge, party’s MLAs G Parameshwara and MB Patil were among the eight MLAs. The other MLAs who took oath included KH Muniyappa, KJ George, Satish Jarkiholi, Ramalinga Reddy and BZ Zameer Ahmed Khan.
Governor Thaawarchand Gehlot administered the oath of office and secrecy to the MLAs at the swearing-in ceremony held at the jam-packed Kanteerava Stadium in Bengaluru. Soon after taking the oath, the Siddaramaiah-led Congress government in Karnataka gave orders to implement five guarantees promised by the party in its poll manifesto while also blaming the Centre for the state’s financial losses as a special grant of Rs 5,495 crore of the 15th Finance Commission was not provided to the state.
The five ‘main’ guarantees are 200 units of free power to all households (Gruha Jyoti); Rs 2,000 monthly assistance to the woman head of every family (Gruha Lakshmi); 10 kg of rice free to every member of a BPL household (Anna Bhagya); Rs 3,000 every month for unemployed graduate youth and Rs 1,500 for unemployed diploma holders (both in the age group of 18-25) for two years (Yuva Nidhi) and free travel for women in public transport buses (Uchita Prayana). Addressing a press briefing after the first Cabinet meeting in Vidhan Soudha, here, Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah said, “Five guarantees in the manifesto were promised and the order for the implementation of those five guarantees was given after the first cabinet meeting. All will be in force after the next cabinet meeting which will be called within a week.”
Congress bagged 135 seats in the May 10 elections to the 224-member Karnataka Assembly ousting the ruling BJP, which got 66 seats while the Janata Dal (Secular) secured 19 seats in the results declared on May 13.PTI
