BS Yeddyurappa sacks 3 ministers ahead of cabinet reshuffle

Chief minister BS Yeddyurappa on Tuesday sacked three ministers from his cabinet ahead of the reshuffle to be held today at 9.30 am at Rajbhavan.

With the exit of sports minister Goolihatti Shekar, higher education minister Aravinda Limbavali and libraries minister Shivanagouda Naik the vacant slots in the cabinet have gone up to six which has a number limit of 34.

The chief minister has the support of the BJP high command to induct his choice of ministers into the cabinet which includes Shobha Karandlaje, V Somanna, CC Patil, A Narayanaswamy, A Ramadas and Vijayashankar. Uncertainty over the reshuffle ended when the BJP national president Nitin Gadkari, after a meeting of party’s national core committee at his residence in Delhi, approved the CM’s list.

The high command, apparently, rejected the suggestion of national general secretary Ananth Kumar to defer the reshuffle till the taluk and zilla panchayat polls are held in December. Yeddyurappa was left with little choice but to sack the three ministers as they defied his directions to quit.

Trouble, however, looms large now. Goolihatti, Limbavali and Naik along with those who failed to make the cut into the ministry, including SK Bellubbi, Belur Gopalakrishna, Appachu Ranjan, CT Ravi and Raju Gowda, have raised the banner of revolt. Reddy brothers, too, have threatened to seek a leadership change if justice was not done to their loyalists who were instrumental in bringing the BJP to power in the state when the party was short of majority in the assembly.