Congress on Thursday early morning finalised Siddaramaiah to be the next Chief Minister of Karnataka while D K Shivakumar will become the Deputy Chief Minister. The decision came after a series of late Wednesday night meetings, which spilled over into the wee hours of Thursday, involving Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Congress General Secretaries KC Venugopal and Randeep Surjewala and the two Karnataka stalwarts.
The oath-taking ceremony will take place on May 20. The Congress will also elect its new CLP leader today.Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge is likely to invite opposition leaders to attend the swearing-in ceremony of Karnataka's news Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, and Deputy CM DK Shivakumar. The Gandhis, Congress CMs and senior Congress leaders to attend the event in Bengaluru, news agency ANI reported quoting sources.
DK Shivakumar will be sworn in as the sole Deputy Chief Minister, along with some significant portfolios. Shivakumar will remain as the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee president. While the Shivakumar camp has claimed that the party leadership has agreed to a two and a half years term sharing formula, it is not clear whether the leadership will announce it publicly.