Karnataka Cabinet expansion: 24 ministers inducted in Siddaramaiah Ministry
Bengaluru (PTI): The Congress government in Karnataka expanded its cabinet on Saturday by inducting 24 ministers thereby filling all the 34 ministerial positions a week after assuming power in the state. Governor Thaawarchand Gehlot administered the oath of office and secrecy to these 24 ministers.
These ministers include 23 MLAs and the Congress high command's surprise candidate N S Boseraju, who is neither an MLA nor an MLC.
"Boseraju, a former MLA and an MLC, is the All India Congress Committee secretary. Hailing from Raichur, he is a committed Congress worker. His name was cleared by the Congress high command yesterday," a Congress leader told PTI.
There were very rare instances of all the sanctioned ministerial positions being filled in Karnataka, a Congress office-bearer said.
The Karnataka government can have 34 ministers. Ten of them, including Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and his deputy D K Shivakumar, were sworn in on May 20. Amid tight security, the swearing in took place at the Raj Bhavan.
MLAs H K Patil, Krishna Byregowda, N Cheluvarayaswamy, K Venkatesh, H C Mahadevappa, Congress working president Eshwar Khandre and former state Congress president Dinesh Gundu Rao are among those who took oath.
Others in the list are: Kyathasandra N Rajanna, Sharanabasappa Darshanapur, Shivanand Patil, Ramappa Balappa Timmapur, S S Mallikarjun, Shivaraj Sangappa Tangadagi, Sharanaprakash Rudrappa Patil, Mankal Vaidya, Laxmi Hebbalkar, Rahim Khan, D Sudhakar, Santosh Lad, N S Boseraju, Suresha B S, Madhu Bangarappa, M C Sudhakar and B Nagendra.
During the oath taking ceremony, supporters of those MLAs who were denied ministerial positions such as M Krishnappa, a four-time MLA, who was also a minister in the previous Congress government led by Siddaramaiah, raised slogans and held placards demanding cabinet berths for their leaders.
Laxmi Hebbalkar, Madhu Bangarappa, D Sudhakar, Cheluvaraya Swami, Mankul Vaidya and M C Sudhakar are close to Shivakumar, according to Congress sources.
Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has struck a balance by giving caste and region-wise representation along with giving due respect to senior as well as junior MLAs, an official statement said on Friday night.
It also said the cabinet will have eight Lingayats. Within them, different sub-sects of the community have been given representation.
There will be five Vokkaligas, including Shivakumar, the statement said.
The cabinet will have nine Scheduled Caste ministers, it said. The portfolios have not been allotted yet. State Minister K H Muniyappa said the portfolios will be announced by evening.
Both Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar had been in Delhi for the past three days and had held several rounds of discussions with the party leadership.
The names of the 24 ministerial candidates were decided after hours of hectic deliberations between Siddaramaiah, Shivakumar and the top central leaders, including AICC general secretaries K C Venugopal and Randeep Surjewala.
Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and former party chief Rahul Gandhi gave the final nod to the list.
Earlier, the two Karnataka leaders also met Sonia Gandhi, for the first time after government formation in the state. Differences between Siddaramaiah and Shivakumar had emerged over names of probable ministers but these were sorted out during the discussions, the sources said.
The Congress stormed into the Vidhana Soudha by winning 135 seats in the 224-member assembly leaving the ruling BJP as a distant second, which won 66 seats while the JD(S) stood third with 19 seats.
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SC dismisses pleas seeking review of 2023 verdict declining legal sanction to same-sex marriage
New Delhi, Jan 9: The Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed a batch of pleas seeking to review its October 2023 verdict declining legal sanction to same-sex marriage.
A five-judge bench of Justices B R Gavai, Surya Kant, B V Nagarathna, P S Narasimha and Dipankar Datta took up about 13 petitions related to the matter in chambers and dismissed them.
"We do not find any error apparent on the face of the record. We further find that the view expressed in both the judgements is in accordance with law and as such, no interference is warranted. Accordingly, the review petitions are dismissed," the bench said.
It said the judges have carefully gone through the judgements delivered by Justice (since retired) S Ravindra Bhat speaking for himself and for Justice (since retired) Hima Kohli as well as the concurring opinion expressed by Justice Pamidighantam Sri Narasimha, constituting the majority view.
The bench also rejected a prayer made in the review petitions for hearing in an open court.
According to practice, the review pleas are considered in chambers by the judges.
The new bench was constituted after Justice Sanjiv Khanna, the present CJI, recused from hearing the review petitions on July 10, 2024.
Notably, Justice P S Narasimha is the only member of the original Constitution bench comprising five judges which delivered the verdict, as former CJI D Y Chandrachud and Justices S K Kaul, Ravindra Bhat and Hima Kohli have retired.
A five-judge Constitution bench led by then CJI Chandrachud on October 17, 2024, refused to accord legal backing to same-sex marriages and held there was "no unqualified right" to marriage with the exception of those recognised by law.
The apex court, however, made a strong pitch for the rights of LGBTQIA++ persons so that they didn't face discrimination in accessing goods and services available to others, safe houses known as "garima greh" in all districts for shelter to members of the community facing harassment and violence, and dedicated hotlines in case of trouble.
In its judgement, the bench held transpersons in heterosexual relationships had the freedom and entitlement to marry under the existing statutory provisions.
It said an entitlement to legal recognition of the right to union, akin to marriage or civil union, or conferring legal status to the relationship could be only done through an "enacted law".
The five-judge Constitution bench delivered four separate verdicts on a batch of 21 petitions seeking legal sanction for same-sex marriages.
All five judges were unanimous in refusing the legal recognition to same-sex marriage under the Special Marriage Act and observed it was within Parliament's ambit to change the law for validating such a union.
While former CJI Chandrachud wrote a separate 247-page verdict, Justice Kaul penned a 17-page judgement where he broadly agreed with the former's views.
Justice Bhat, who authored an 89-page judgement for himself and Justice Kohli, disagreed with certain conclusions arrived at by the former CJI, including on applicability of adoption rules for such couples.
Justice Narasimha in his 13-page verdict was in complete agreement with the reasoning and conclusion of Justice Bhat.
The judges were unanimous in holding that queerness was a natural phenomenon and not an "urban or elite" notion.
In his judgement, the former CJI recorded Solicitor General Tushar Mehta's assurance of forming a committee chaired by the cabinet secretary to define and elucidate the scope of entitlements of such couples in a union.
The LGBTQIA++ rights activists, who won a major legal battle in 2018 in the Supreme Court, which decriminalised consensual gay sex, moved the apex court seeking validation of same-sex marriages and consequential reliefs such as rights to adoption, enrolment as parents in schools, opening of bank accounts and availing succession and insurance benefits.
Some of the petitioners sought the apex court to use its plenary power besides the "prestige and moral authority" to push the society to acknowledge such a union and ensure LGBTQIA++ persons led a "dignified" life like heterosexuals.
