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Correspondent

23 August 2024 at 4:29:04 pm

Fractured Crown

Between Siddaramaiah’s grip on power and Shivakumar’s restless ambition, the Karnataka Congress is trapped in a succession spiral. Karnataka Karnataka today has two chief ministers - one by office, the other by expectation. The power tussle between Siddaramaiah and his deputy, D.K. Shivakumar, has slipped so completely into the open that the Congress’s ritual denials sound like political farce. A whispered ‘understanding’ after the 2023 victory that each would get the CM’s post after...

Fractured Crown

Between Siddaramaiah’s grip on power and Shivakumar’s restless ambition, the Karnataka Congress is trapped in a succession spiral. Karnataka Karnataka today has two chief ministers - one by office, the other by expectation. The power tussle between Siddaramaiah and his deputy, D.K. Shivakumar, has slipped so completely into the open that the Congress’s ritual denials sound like political farce. A whispered ‘understanding’ after the 2023 victory that each would get the CM’s post after two-and-a-half years has hardened into a public confrontation between a chief minister determined to finish five years and a deputy increasingly unwilling to wait. The recent breakfast meeting between the two men at Siddaramaiah’s residence was presented as a truce where the ‘high command’ was invoked as the final arbiter. “There are no differences between us,” Siddaramaiah insisted, twice for emphasis. Few were convinced and soon, Shivakumar was again hinting darkly at change. For weeks, Shivakumar’s loyalists have been holding meetings, mobilising legislators and making pilgrimages to Delhi to get the Congress high command to honour its promise. They insist that the Congress leadership agreed to a rotational chief ministership in 2023 and that November 2025 was always meant to mark Shivakumar’s ascent. The high command, for its part, has perfected the art of strategic vagueness by neither confirming nor denying the pact. This suggests that the Congress does not merely hesitate to act against Siddaramaiah, but increasingly lacks the capacity to do so. From the outset of his second innings, Siddaramaiah has given no signal of easing aside. As he approaches January 2026, poised to overtake D. Devaraj Urs as Karnataka’s longest-serving chief minister, the symbolism is unmistakable. The mantle of social justice politics that Urs once embodied now firmly sits on Siddaramaiah’s shoulders. And it is this social coalition that shields him. His fortress is AHINDA - minorities, backward classes and Dalits. Leaked figures from the unreleased caste census suggest that these groups together approach or exceed two-thirds of the state’s population. Lingayats and Vokkaligas, once electorally dominant, are rendered numerical minorities in this arithmetic. Siddaramaiah governs not merely as a Congress leader, but as the putative custodian of Karnataka’s demographic majority. That claim is reinforced through policy. Minority scholarships have been revived, contractor quotas restored, residential schools expanded. More than Rs. 42,000 crore has been earmarked for Scheduled Castes and Tribes. Kurubas, his own community, have been pitched for Scheduled Tribe status, with careful assurances that their elevation will not disadvantage others. DK Shivakumar brings organisational muscle, financial clout and control over the Vokkaliga heartland. In electoral campaigns, these are formidable assets. But in a confrontation with a leader who embodies a 60–70 percent social coalition, they are blunt instruments. The Congress high command understands this equation, even if it publicly pretends otherwise. It also remembers, uneasily, what Siddaramaiah did the last time his authority was constrained. In 2020, when the Congress–JD(S) coalition collapsed after 16 MLAs defected to Mumbai,13 of them hailed from Siddaramaiah’s camp. At the time, he held the post of coordination committee chairman. Instead, he emerged as the principal beneficiary of collapse, returning as Leader of the Opposition with a tighter grip on the party. If the Congress high command could not punish him then, it is doubtful it can coerce him now. Shivakumar’s predicament is thus more tragic than tactical. He is not battling a rival alone, but an entire political structure built to outlast him. The promised coronation looks increasingly like a mirage drifting just ahead of a man condemned to keep walking. For the Congress, the cost of this paralysis is already visible. A government elected on guarantees and governance is consumed by succession. The party’s authority is dissolving while its factions harden. The Congress returned to power in Karnataka after years in the wilderness, only to re-enact the same leadership dysfunction that has crippled it elsewhere. Regardless of whether Siddaramaiah survives this storm, it is becoming increasingly clear that the Congress cannot survive the slow corrosion of its command in one of the few states it holds today.

Worries Over Displacements

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If we see thoroughly, it is a clear-cut fact that dams and reservoirs provide economic and social benefits that contribute drastically to the management of water, which is becoming an inadequate resource. Nevertheless, these dams and reservoirs may have undesirable environmental and social impacts. The most challenging social impact of dams is the displacement of native people. This is one of the worst impacts of the dam construction on communities, people, all the families in the vicinity and even some villages that have been forced to leave their homes and relocate somewhere else. Therefore, there is tremendous pressure on the government for detailed and accurate assessments by experts to anticipate the socio-economic impacts. The dam affected and displaced people are more in number in Maharashtra than any other state.


Peasants in Maharashtra fought the first struggle against dams in early 1920s, which opposed the Mulshi dam built by the Tatas. Significantly, this is the first known movement organized by the dam-affected persons in India and throughout the world. However, for various reasons, this movement failed. Since then, the fight for survival of displaced people has continued. The venue might be different in the state but the pursuit to get justice is never-ending.


The Sardar Sarovar Dam was proposed in 1961 on the Narmada river near Navagam in Gujarat. It is the largest in a series of large irrigation and hydroelectric multi-purpose dams on the river. The dam has been the focal point of one of India’s largest public movements against mass displacement of farmers, fisherfolk and indigenous people living within the submergence area of the dam. The movement against the dam, known as Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA), is led by social activist Medha Patkar.


Initially the government identified 2,000 families equivalent to about 1,50,000 people -- as affected in the states of Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Gujarat. The Sardar Sarovar Dam’s construction was completed to its full height of 138.68 metres in 2017, and the NCA permitted filling the dam to its full capacity based on a clearance from its rehabilitation sub-group that all families had been rehabilitated. Thirty-three villages in Maharashtra were submerged, 4,300 families displaced. According to data from the Narmada Bachao Andolan, 4,135 families were resettled over the last 25 years. Efforts are under way to rehabilitate remaining families, this is a reply form the Maharashtra government for last two decades.


The most challenging social impact of the dam is the displacement of native people. During the vacation their ancestral land and houses were acquired by the government. They are still living in re -settlement. Government forcefully tried to shift them to villages. Some villagers, particularly the old people, succumbed to the strong-arm tactics. But still there are people who are relentlessly fighting for the cause. They categorically refused to move out of the submerged area.

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