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The Congress on Sunday appointed three central observers, including senior leader Sushil Kumar Shinde, to help elect the new Karnataka chief minister, amid hectic lobbying for the top post.
Besides Shinde, a former chief minister of Maharashtra, the other observers are party general secretary Jitendra Singh and former All India Congress Committee general secretary Deepak Babaria.
Congress leader and All India Congress Committee (AICC) in charge of Karnataka Randeep Surjewala said on Sunday that the Congress Legislative Party (CLP) has unanimously passed the resolution and the observers will seek the opinions of all MLAs and convey it to the party high command.
This comes after the CLP meeting in Bengaluru which was attended by senior leaders Siddaramaiah, D K Shivakumar, Randeep Surjewala, K C Venugopal, Jairam Ramesh and others.
"The first CLP meeting has concluded and two resolutions were passed in it. The resolution has thanked 6.5 crore Kannadigas, party president Mallikarjun Kharge, Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi, Siddaramaiah, D K Shivakumar and all the party workers for their stellar work in ensuring that constitution and democracy are protected not just in Karnataka, but the state has again shown the way for democracy and constitution to the rest of India," Surjewala told reporters.
"The resolution was moved by D K Shivakumar. It was seconded by MB Patil and was also endorsed by other Congress leaders including B K Hari Prasad," he added.
Surjewala said that another single-line resolution was moved by former chief minister Siddaramaiah to authorise the AICC president for appointing a new leader of the CLP party.
"Former CM Siddaramaiah, moved the single-line resolution authorising AICC president to appoint a new leader of the CLP party and 135 Cong MLAs proceeded to unanimously approve his resolution. It was endorsed by DK Shivakumar also and everybody else. Cong General Secretary KC Venugopal informed Kharge about the resolutions," the AICC in charge said.
He added, "The AICC president then instructed K C Venugopal that the three senior observers; former minister Sushil Kumar Shinde, Deepak Babaria and Jitendra Singh to seek individual opinions of each legislator and convey them to the high command."
Congress general secretary K C Venugopal said the process of taking the opinion of MLAs will be completed by tonight itself and after that, the observers will move to Delhi to apprise the AICC president about the opinion.
"This process of taking the opinion of the MLAs will be completed tonight itself. As Randeep Surjewala said, this is a unanimous resolution moved by Siddaramaiah and supported by DK Shivakumar and all the senior leaders," Venugopal said.
The Congress Legislature Party (CLP) unanimously decided in the meeting to leave the selection of the new Karnataka Chief Minister to the All India Congress Committee (AICC) president Mallikarjun Kharge.
'The Congress Legislature Party unanimously resolves that AICC President is hereby authorised to appoint the new leader of the Congress Legislature Party,' the resolution stated.
Ahead of the CLP meeting on Sunday, a huge number of supporters gathered outside the residence of Shivakumar in Bengaluru and raised slogans of 'We want DK Shivakumar as CM'.