Criticising the Governor’s decision to allow prosecution of Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah in the MUDA case, Minister for Large and Medium Industries M.B. Patil said that the BJP will have to repent for this move.
Calling the Governor a puppet of the Central Government, he alleged that the Raj Bhavan has turned into an office of the BJP.
On August 17, Mr. Patil told reporters, “When T. J. Abraham filed a complaint against the CM, the Chief Secretary of the government provided all necessary information to the Raj Bhavan. However, the Governor hastily issued a notice to Mr. Siddaramaiah. There was already suspicion about his conduct. This current move is undesirabl,e, and the people of Karnataka will not tolerate it.”
He accused the Governor of ignoring requests for prosecution of former CM and JD(S) leader H.D. Kumaraswamy and former minister Shashikala Jolle, which have been pending for over eight months, while taking undue interest in the MUDA scam, which Mr. Patil claimed has no merit.
“The BJP government at the Centre has brought its bad politics to Karnataka, just as it has done in Delhi and Tamil Nadu,” he said, adding that this was a sign of the Central Government’s impatience with the Congress-led government, which was elected with a massive majority.
Mr. Patil argued that MUDA had committed a mistake, not Mr. Siddaramaiah. “Mr. Siddaramaiah’s family was given alternative sites by the BJP government,” he claimed.
He pointed out that BJP leaders were present at the MUDA meeting when these decisions were taken.