Patience, prayers, and perseverance are core to Karnataka's Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar, the likely successor to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, who has been asked to step down by the Congress high command as per an unconfirmed power-sharing agreement of 2.5 years, struck when the Congress came to power in the state in 2023.
Ending months of suspense over the change of guard, the Congress high command called both Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar to New Delhi on 26 May, where the outgoing CM was asked to ensure a smooth transition of power.
Siddaramaiah is expected to resign in a day or two, followed by a Congress Legislature Party meeting where Shivakumar's name will be announced, AICC sources told The Quint. Shivakumar, who is also in charge of the state Congress party since March 2020 (he officially took charge on 2 July 2020), will be replaced by a person of Siddaramaiah's choice. The party is likely to pick a Dalit or a Lingayat face.
Though Siddaramaiah is said to have opposed Shivakumar's candidature as his successor, the Congress high command is learnt to have finalised on giving the latter his due. Siddaramaiah was keen that his successor should be a Dalit, with Home Minister G Parameshwara reportedly as his choice.
An Honourable Exit
Even as the AICC general secretary (organisation) KC Venugopal, in the day-long discussions to the media, dismissed talks of leadership change as mere speculation, stating they centred around the four Rajya Sabha and seven legislative council seats elections scheduled on 18 June, speculation was rife that Siddaramaiah had been asked to step down.
He was reportedly offered a Rajya Sabha seat and a bigger role in national politics as an honourable exit, which he is said to have rejected. This was not surprising as Siddaramaiah had rejected a similar offer made by Congress leader Sonia Gandhi, when he missed the CM's post in the past.
Siddaramaiah, who turns 79 in August, who had been claiming that he would complete the full term, while in the same breath maintaining he would step down if Congress leader and Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, asks him to, is said to have told senior leaders Venugopal, Mallikarjun M Kharge, and Randeep Singh Surjewala in the meeting, that he was unaware of any "2.5-year formula'' regarding the possible power-sharing arrangement in Karnataka.
Siddaramaiah's confidence about completing a five-year term stemmed from the backing of Rahul Gandhi all these months.
Congress sources privy to the developments told The Quint that it was Rahul Gandhi, who, during his on-one-on meeting with Siddaramaiah, made the Rajya Sabha seat offer to him, reportedly stating that the latter could forge a new beginning at the national level.
In his third year of governance, Siddaramaiah had been planning to go in for a Cabinet restructure. Over 30 debutant Congress MLAs had petitioned the party high command recently for Cabinet berths during the proposed reshuffle.
With the impasse over power tussle resolved, the challenge is whether Siddaramaiah's camp comprising his Cabinet colleagues and legislators will accept the decision without a whimper. Dinner meetings and multiple trips to New Delhi by legislators owing allegiance to Siddaramaiah and to Shivakumar had commenced after the government crossed the midway mark of its five-year term in November 2025.
'Records are Meant to be Broken'
A CM stepping down before completing their five-year term is not new to Karnataka. Corruption charges, withdrawal of support by the coalition partner or advancing age, as in the case of BS Yediyurappa during his fourth term as the CM, have been reasons for CMs stepping down in the past. Siddaramaiah is the first CM, however, to agree to a transfer of power midway through his term.
In 2007, HD Kumaraswamy, now Union minister, had declined to transfer power to Yediyurappa in the 20:20 agreement.
After equalling the record held by D Devaraj Urs as the longest serving CM of Karnataka, Siddaramaiah surpassed it on 7 January earlier this year by clocking seven years and 240 days in office across two terms.
"Records are meant to be broken,'' he told the media, drawing a sports analogy to compare his feat with Virat Kohli breaking Sachin Tendulkar's record in cricket. He also presented a record-breaking 17th state budget for financial year 2026-27.
A Mass Leader
Representing the Kuruba (shepherd) community, who account for 7.5 percent or 7 million of Karnataka’s 63 million population, according to leaked data of the now rejected caste census survey conducted in 2015, Siddaramaiah is a mass leader recognised for his strong grassroots connections across Karnataka.
He has built his legacy as a champion of the backward classes under the Ahinda umbrella (Kannada acronym for minorities, backward classes, and Dalits). The Congress' return to power in Karnataka after a decade in the 2023 Assembly elections is attributed to the Ahinda votes apart from anti-incumbency for the BJP government.
Fondly referred to as 'Tagaru' (Ram) or 'Huliya' (Tiger), Siddaramaiah pioneered his Bhagyas or welfare schemes initiated during his first tenure in power with the Anna Bhagya scheme, which provides 30 kg of subsidised ration to families below the poverty line. Other notable Bhagya schemes include the Ksheera Bhagya scheme, which provides free milk to children in government and aided schools and Anganwadi centres to combat malnutrition.
“I know the pain of hunger and the value of food,” Siddaramaiah had said in 2013, while implementing the Anna Bhagya.
His slew of programmes for the minorities during his second stint as the CM drew flak—from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) dubbing it as a "halal budget'' to party MLC CT Ravi referring to him as 'Siddaramullah Khan' to allude to the CM's policies and appeasement politics purportedly favouring the Muslims.
A senior Congress leader, comparing Siddaramaiah's two tenures as the CM, told The Quint,
"The zest and the magic touch of Siddaramaiah as the CM from 2013 to 2018 is missing now. One reason is that he had no contenders eyeing his post then, and Siddaramaiah could politically breathe freely. However, the tussle over power sharing started from the first day of his taking charge as the CM in 2023 with the Congress in Karnataka having three power centres—Siddaramaiah, Shivakumar, and AICC president Kharge, and political fatigue was showing on him.''
Shivakumar, the Go-To Man
In contrast to Siddaramaiah, what does Shivakumar bring to the table?
Shivakumar has been the go-to man of the Congress, and climbed the rungs of power in the party first as a student leader. The 64-year-old leader has stuck his neck out to help the Congress during crises in states outside Karnataka, earning the BJP's ire. One of the richest politicians in the country, Shivakumar was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate in connection with an alleged money-laundering and hawala case and spent 50 days in jail.
Representing the Vokkaliga community, Shivakumar brings with him his electoral management and organisational skills. He has been trying to position himself as the Vokkaliga leader with his political mentor being late former CM SM Krishna.
The Vokkaliga community, however, still looks up to to former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda as their leader. Moreover, unlike Siddaramaiah, Shivakumar has not been able to win the Ahinda vote bank, the Congress' committed vote base, with his reach limited to the Vokkaliga community.
Shivakumar has been open about his chief ministerial ambitions, saying, "He wants to give his seniors the chance before staking claim.'' A deeply religious person as opposed to the self-declared agnostic Siddaramaiah, Shivakumar's temple runs after the Congress government crossed the halfway mark to get the CM's post became a talking point.
"Efforts may fail, but prayers will not go waste,'' he had said.
At one time, when it seemed that Siddaramaiah will be allowed to complete his full term, a disappointed Shivakumar had said, "What options do I have? I have to stand by him and support him. I have no objection to him. We will fulfill whatever the party high command tells us to do.''
Once the state settles down again under a new CM, the Congress challenge is to retain the Ahinda vote base, which Siddaramaiah has built. According to a Congress leader, "Shivakumar's challenge will be to win the minorities' trust, consolidate the Lingayat and the Vokkaliga communities, who have drifted to the BJP, redress the anti-incumbency that has set in, and win over Siddaramaiah's camp followers.''
(Naheed Ataulla is a senior political journalist based in Bengaluru. This is an opinion piece, and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)