Siddaramaiah
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Siddaramaiah (b. 12 August 1948) is a politician active in the south Indian state of Karnataka, India. A member of the Indian National Congress party, he is currently Leader of the Opposition in the Karnataka Legislative Assembly.[1] Earlier, as a Janata Dal (Secular) leader, he was Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka on two occasions. He is a leader of the Kuruba Gowdas community.
He was born on 12 August 1948 in a remote village called Siddaramanahundi in Varuna Hobli of Mysore District.
In 1978, Siddaramaiah began his political career when he was elected to the Mysore Taluk Board. Contesting on a Bharatiya Lok Dal ticket from Chamundeshwari constituency, he entered the 7th Karnataka Legislative Assembly in 1983. His was a surprise victory and it earned him name and fame in the Old Mysore region. Later he joined the ruling Janata Party and became the first president of Kannada Watchdog Committee (Kannada Kavalu Samiti) set up to supervise the implementation of Kannada as official language. During the mid-term polls in 1985, Siddaramaiah was re-elected from the same constituency and became Minister for Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Services. In Chief Minister Ramakrishna Hegde's government, he handled diverse portfolios such as Sericulture, Animal Husbandry and Transport portfolios during different stages.
He tasted his first defeat in 1989 assembly elections when veteran Congress leader Rajashekaramurthy humbled him. Later in 1992 he was appointed as Secretary General of Janata Dal, which gained strength after H. D. Deve Gowda joined hands with Hegde.
He was elected again in the 1994 State Elections and became the Minister for Finance in the Janata Dal government headed by Deve Gowda. He was made Deputy Chief minister when J. H. Patel became Chief Minister in 1996. After the split in the Janata Dal, he joined the Janata Dal (Secular) faction of Deve Gowda and became the president of its state unit. However, he lost in the 1999 state elections. In 2004, when the Indian National Congress and JDS formed a coalition government with Dharam Singh as Chief minister, he was again appointed as Deputy Chief Minister.[2]
In 2006, after differences with his mentor Deve Gowda, Siddaramaiah joined the Congress. He won the Chamundeshwari bypolls by a slender margin of 257 votes against Shivabasappa who was the joint candidate of the BJP and the JD(S).[3] In the 2008 state Assembly elections, he contested from Varuna Constituency and was re-elected for the fifth time.