Congress leader DK Shivakumar, who has settled for the number two post in Karnataka after days of hard negotiations, today said he had "accepted the high command's decision like we have to accept a judge's verdict in court".
The Congress today announced that Siddaramaiah will be the next Chief Minister of Karnataka and Mr Shivakumar his "only deputy", ending five days of suspense. They will be sworn in on Saturday.
Mr Shivakumar, 61, fought hard and refused to back down on his demand for the chief minister's post until Sonia Gandhi stepped in. He finally agreed to "sacrifice in the interest of the party".
"Once we agree that we will leave it to the high command, we have to accept the verdict. A lot of us will be arguing in court. Ultimately, what the judge said has to be accepted. All 135 MLAs, all of us joined and said we will leave it to the high command," Mr Shivakumar told NDTV in an exclusive interview.
"We assured the people of Karnataka. Personal interest comes later, party interest is first. That is what my commitment is," he said.
"Ultimately, for various reasons, suppose if we had not won, what would have been the position? Now we have won, we have to get the fruit out of it. It is not me alone, lakhs and lakhs of workers have done their best. We will have to look at their end also," he added.
Asked whether it was Sonia Gandhi's persuasion that finally settled the conflict, Mr Shivakumar said: "I don't want to bring Mrs Gandhi or the Gandhi family into this. I just met Rahul (Gandhi) ji. I met Mallikarjun Kharge. I met AICC (All India Congress Committee) office bearers, that's it."
On power-sharing with Siddaramaiah after their tussle for power, Mr Shivakumar said: "The work has to start. It needs a week or something to start. Let it start...let us see the success story."
He dismissed questions about how the Congress would deliver on its five guarantees promise, believed to cost about Rs 51,000 crore.
"You leave it to us, we have a dedicated team for it. We have just worked out all the economics," he said, not elaborating.
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