Four MLAs from Kalyana Karnataka, including B. Sriramulu who represents Molakalmur constituency in Chitradurga district, joined the newly formed Basavaraj Bommai Cabinet on Wednesday. B.S. Anand Singh from Vijayanagar constituency in Vijayanagar district, Halappa Achar from Yelburga constituency in Koppal district and Prabhu Chauhan from Aurad constituency in Bidar are the other three who was administered oath by Governor Thaawarchand Gehlot at the Raj Bhavan.
Mr. Anand Singh, a four-time MLA, was among the 17 members who resigned from their Assembly memberships to pull down the Janata Dal(S)-Congress coalition government headed by H.D. Kumaraswamy subsequently paving the way for the installation of the BJP government headed by B.S. Yediyurappa. He won the 2008 and 2013 Assembly elections on BJP ticket and the 2018 election on Congress ticket. He served as the Minister for Tourism in the Jagadish Shettar government and as Minister for Forest, Environment and Ecology and Infrastructure Development, Haj and Waqf Department in the B.S. Yediyurappa government. Mr. Singh played an important role in the formation of the Vijayanagar district with Hosapete as its headquarters by carving out six taluks from Ballari district. The 55-year old politician is also a businessman involved in the mining and transport businesses. However, he is also an accused in 17 cases that are in different stages of investigation by SIT and CBI.
Mr. Sriramulu, a 50-year old Ballari-based prominent Valmiki leader, is a four-time MLA. He first entered the Assembly in 2004 by winning the Ballari City constituency. He was made Minister for Tourism in the Janata Dal(S)-BJP coalition government. He won the 2008 elections and was inducted into the B.S. Yediyurappa Cabinet as Minister for Health and Family Welfare. However, he had to resign after he was indicted in a Lokayukta report on illegal mining in 2011. He fought the 2011 byelection as an Independent candidate in Ballari and won it. In 2012, he launched his own party, BSR Congress, and contested the 2013 Assembly elections. Four candidates from his party, including himself, won the elections.
By the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, he joined his mother party, the BJP, and won the Ballari constituency on its ticket. He contested the 2018 Assembly elections from Molakalmuru in Chitradurga district and Badami in Bagalkot district and he won the former and lost the latter to the then Chief Minister Siddaramaiah with a slender margin of 1,696 votes. He was inducted into the B.S. Yediyurappa cabinet as the Minister for Health and Family Welfare Minister. Later, he was given additional charge of the Backward Classes Welfare Department. In the mid of the COVID-19 crisis in 2020, he was relieved from Health Department and given charge of the Social Welfare Department.
Sixtynine-year-old Halappa Achar represents Yelburga constituency, Koppal district, that he won in 2018 by defeating his Congress rival Basavaraj Rayaraddi with a margin of 13,318 votes. He had earlier been elected to the Legislative Council in 2010 as a representative of local authorities constituency from Raichur and Koppal districts. Mr. Achar, a farmer by profession, is widely known for his contributions to the cooperatives field. The revival of Raichur DCC Bank in the late 1980s was widely attributed to Mr. Achar who was its chairman in 1988-89. In 2005-06, the H.D. Kumaraswamy government recognised Mr. Achar’s contributions to the field by honouring him with the Sahakari Ratna Award. Later, he served as the director and chairman of Karnataka State Cooperative Marketing Federation and director of Indian Farmers Fertilizer Cooperative Limited and Apex Bank.
Prabhu Chauhan, a three-time MLA from Aurad constituency in Bidar district, will continue as a Minister in the Basavaraj Bommai Cabinet. The 52-year-old leader belongs to Banjara (Lambani) community and was the Minister for Animal Husbandry for two years in the B.S. Yediyurappa-led BJP government. Mr. Chauhan won the 2018 Assembly elections by defeating his Congress rival Vijay Kumar with a margin of 10,592 votes. In the 2008 and 2013 Assembly elections, he won with a thumping margin of 27,778 votes and 23,191 votes, respectively.
