BJP’s Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri set to become K''taka Speaker

Bengaluru, July 30

Senior BJP MLA Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri is all set to become the next Speaker of the Karnataka Assembly as he is the only candidate to file his nomination papers for the post on Tuesday.

At expiry of the deadline at noon, six-time MLA Kageri was the only one to have filed the nomination papers for the post, which fell vacant after KR Ramesh Kumar quit on Monday.

“We received only one nomination, that of Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri,” an official in the Karnataka Assembly secretariat told PTI.

Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa and BJP leaders Govind Karjol, R Ashok, Jagadish Shettar, KS Eshwarappa and S Suresh Kumar were present when Kageri submitted his nomination to Karnataka Assembly secretary MK Vishalakshi.

Ramesh Kumar had resigned after a 14-month-long tenure under the Congress-JDS coalition government on Monday after the three-day-old BS Yediyurappa government won the vote of confidence in the Assembly.

A Congress spokesperson said the party did not field any candidate because the BJP had the majority and it had been the convention of electing the Speaker unopposed.

The JD(S) spokesperson, too, echoed the same views.

The election of Kageri would be formally announced when the Assembly met on Wednesday, BJP sources said.

After being an active member of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, Kageri climbed up the political ladder.

Kageri got elected to the Karnataka Assembly from Ankola Assembly seat in 1994 and since then there has been no looking back.

Kageri had also served as the minister for primary and secondary education. PTI