BENGALURU: Former chief minister Siddaramaiah on Monday demanded a judicial probe into the police firing on anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protesters in Mangaluru, and said that a CID inquiry ordered by the state government will not bring out the truth.“The CID officers are policemen, and since police are involved in the firing, you can’t expect justice in such an inquiry. It is eyewash and a strategy to protect those who have committed wrong,” he told reporters.
He slammed the police for naming the two men killed in police firing, as accused in the FIR, saying he had never seen such a thing before. Alleging that most of those named in the FIR are students and labourers who have been framed in the case, he urged police to release them immediately, and drop charges against them.
He also alleged that it was the police who instigated violence, and so Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa and Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai should own up to the killings. “Police claiming they had to open fire on agitators because they tried to torch a police station is a concocted story to save face,” he alleged. Referring to a viral video in which a police inspector is heard saying “no one was killed” despite several rounds being fired, Siddaramaiah said the officer should be dismissed immediately.
He alleged that the BJP government not allowing him to visit Mangaluru a day after police firing, was “murder of democracy”. “In a democracy, the opposition leader is like a shadow CM and should correct the government when it goes wrong. I was not allowed to do it. However, Shobha Karandlaje, who is not even a representative of the Mangaluru people, was allowed to visit the city. She made false allegations against the Congress, at the behest of the CM,” he said.
He alleged that the Mangaluru golibar was a result of the state government’s total failure to maintain law and order. A section of BJP leaders was not happy with Yediyurappa becoming chief minister, and may have orchestrated the police firing, he added.
‘Kalladka is CM of DK, Udupi’
Earlier, talking to reporters at Mangaluru airport, Siddaramaiah said that RSS leader Kalladka Prabhakar Bhat is the CM of Dakshina Kannada and Udupi, and holds the remote control of CM Yediyurappa.