(1) Siddaramaiah 2.0 in Karnataka
Siddaramaiah was sworn in as chief minister for the second term, along with state Congress president D.K. Shivakumar as deputy chief minister, and eight legislators as ministers on Saturday, exactly a week after the party swept the Assembly polls in Karnataka.
The Legislators who were sworn in as ministers are:
75-year-old Siddaramaiah, who had earlier served as the chief minister of Karnataka from 2013 to 2018, emerged as the Congress pick for the top post after a hectic tussle with Mr. Shivakumar. As both the leaders insisted on the top job, government formation was deadlocked and it reportedly took the intervention of former Congress chief Sonia Gandhi to resolve it.
Also read |Striking a balance between castes and regions a daunting task for Congress
After registering a resounding victory in the recently-concluded Assembly elections with 135 seats, the highest for Congress since 1989, the party is grappling with the problem of Cabinet formation. Party sources indicated that there were around 65 aspirants for the 32 Cabinet berths available to be filled. Despite multiple consultations in Delhi on Friday, the Congress seems to have not arrived at consensus on the Cabinet formation as just 8 names have been finalised. Some of the senior leaders and Cabinet probables have not made the cut in the first list. Party sources said that the lobbying has been intense as every pressure group has been exerting pressure for the Cabinet berths even as the party is trying to balance caste and community equations and regional representation.
Also read |In first meeting, Karnataka Cabinet decides to implement 5 guarantees of Congress
Meanwhile, the Congress turned the swearing-in ceremony into a message displaying unity of parties across India that oppose the BJP, and set a platform for diverse parties to come together ahead of the Lok Sabha elections in 2024. The occasion was marked by the presence of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, his Deputy Tejaswi Yadav, former Chief Ministers of Jammu & Kashmir Farooq Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti, CPI leader D. Raja, CPI (M) leader Sitaram Yechury, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin, actor-turned-politician Kamal Hassan, and former Maharashtra Chief Minister Sharad Pawar.
Also read |The BJP’s Karnataka defeat — a blow to its mythmaking
(2) Supreme Court gets two new judges
Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud on Friday administered the oath of office to Justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and K.V. Viswanathan. Their additions brought the Supreme Court to full capacity of 34.
Their names were cleared in just 48 hours by the Centre. This comes in the backdrop of the government facing heat for unduly delaying Collegium recommendations. A 2021 judgment had fixed a maximum of 18 weeks (126 days) for the Centre to process recommendations for judicial appointments. In November last year, a Supreme Court Bench noted that recommendations more than a year old were pending before the government. Delays also led to candidates withdrawing their names, or candidates dying before the government makes a decision.
Also read |The Court and the problem with its collegium
The apex court has had vacancies for most of the months since February 2016. No recruitments were made between December 2019 and August 2021, and vacancies rose from one to eight. On February 6 this year, five appointments brought down vacancies to two. Then, on February 13, another two appointments were made, bringing the court to full strength.
The two new judges replaced the positions of Justices Dinesh Maheshwari and M.R. Shah, who retired earlier this month. More retirements are on the way this year. Justice S. Ravindra Bhat retires in October and Justice Kaul, who is number two judge in the Supreme Court, retires in December. Two years later, seven judges are set to retire from the apex court.
Meanwhile, the recent portfolio change announced by the Centre that removed Kiren Rijiju from the Law and Justice Ministry might have been a move by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to avoid any escalation in his regime’s confrontations with the judiciary in the one year left in his current tenure.
(3) The 76th Festival de Cannes
The Cannes Film Festival red carpet sprang to life on Tuesday with the premiere of the Louis XV period drama Jeanne du Barry, with Johnny Depp, as the French Riviera movie pageant launched a star-studded and potentially controversy-rife 76th edition.
A coterie of stars streamed down Cannes’ famous red carpet for the opening night ceremony, including Brie Larson, Uma Thurman, Gong Li, Elle Fanning, Naomi Campbell, Catherine Deneuve (who graces this year’s festival poster), and a blue-haired Helen Mirren, who carried a fan labeled #worthit.
Also Read | Cannes 2023: Johnny Depp says he has no ‘further need for Hollywood’
Anderson’s sci-fi homage Asteroid City, Wenders’ Perfect Days and Loach’s The Old Oak are among 19 movies competing for the coveted Palme d’Or, the festival’s top prize.
The schedule for the festival includes Cannes-favorite directors such as Italy’s Nanni Moretti (Il Sol Dell’Avvenire), Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda (Monster), and Turkey’s Nuri Bilge Ceylan (About Dry Grasses). There are a record six female directors in the competition, including France’s Catherine Breillat with L’été Dernier, Austria’s Jessica Hausner with Club Zero, and Italy’s Alice Rohrwacher with La Chimera.
Union Minister of State for Information & Broadcasting L. Murugan inaugurated the India pavilion at Cannes’ Marché du Film on Wednesday.
Addressing a gathering, Mr. Murugan said today India was the world’s largest producer of films with over 3,000 films in more than 50 languages. “These films carry a message of India’s strength in storytelling across the world,” he said. Citing the example of the now famed Elephant Whisperers of Mudumalai, the Minister said: “We are witnessing an era where Indian content is going local to global.”
Bollywood actors like Mrunal, Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Sara Ali Khan, Esha Gupta, and others have been making stunning appearances at Cannes this year. The festival commenced on May 16 and will conclude on May 27.
(4) Eight seats in the Karnataka assembly were decided by wafer-thin margins of less than 1,000 votes
At the end of the high-pitched Karnataka Assembly elections, Jayanagar constituency, where 16 votes separated the winner and the loser, became a talking point. As many as eight seats were decided by wafer-thin margins of less than 1,000 votes with the Congress and the BJP having five and three such victories, respectively.
In the run-up to the elections, observers had pointed out multiple reasons for the contests to heat up resulting in close contests and lower margins. Eventually, Gandhinagar (105 votes), Sringeri (201 votes), Malur (248 votes), and Kumta (676 votes) were among the five constituencies that witnessed close contests apart from Jayanagar. This apart, the BJP also won four constituencies by narrow margins that were between 1,000 votes and 2,000 votes.
(5) Turkey presidential election headed for run-off vote
Turkey’s electoral chief said that the presidential race will go to a second round on May 28 as incumbent Recep Tayyip Erdogan fell just short of an outright victory, which would have extended his increasingly authoritarian rule into a third decade.
Six Opposition parties came together to seize the momentum and fielded a joint candidate, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, a mild-mannered former bureaucrat who promised to arrest Turkey’s “slide towards authoritarianism” and fix its economy.
Also Read | Weaker by the year: on the elections in Turkey and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan
Most opinion polls predicted that Mr. Erdoğan was trailing Mr. Kılıçdaroğlu. Yet, in the preliminary results, Mr. Erdoğan won 49.5% of the votes in the presidential election, a tad lower than the threshold that would have avoided a run-off, against Mr. Kılıçdaroğlu’s 44.9%. The President’s nationalist-conservative coalition also took a comfortable majority in Parliament.
In the last presidential election in 2018, Mr. Erdogan grabbed 52.6% of the vote in the first round, winning outright.
Mr. Erdoğan was facing serious criticism, particularly about his mismanagement of the economy. Turkey’s lira has lost some 60% of its value against the dollar in just two years. Foreign investors are fleeing and the current account deficit is ballooning. Annual inflation has hit the middle-class. After a devastating earthquake in February, the government’s response to the calamity and its building permit rules were slammed. Yet, the Opposition failed to turn these challenges Mr. Erdoğan faced into votes.
Also Read | Twitter censors content ahead of presidential election
Despite the prospect of a runoff this time, Mr. Erdogan, who has governed Turkey as either prime minister or president since 2003, painted the vote as a victory both for himself and the country.
“That the election results have not been finalized doesn’t change the fact that the nation has chosen us,” Erdogan, 69, told supporters in the early hours of Monday. He said he would respect the nation’s decision if the race went to a second round on May 28.
Mr. Kilicdaroglu sounded hopeful for an eventual victory.
“We will absolutely win the second round ... and bring democracy” said Mr. Kilicdaroglu, 74, maintaining that Mr. Erdogan had lost the trust of a nation now demanding change. Kilicdaroglu and his party have lost all previous presidential and parliamentary elections since he took leadership in 2010 but increased their votes this time.
Also Read | Turkish candidate Kilicdaroglu hardens stance before runoff against Erdogan
