BENGALURU: KPCC president DK Shivakumar claimed that the political scenario in Karnataka cannot be compared with Gujarat, and predicted 136 seats for the Congress and 66 for the ruling BJP in the 2023 assembly polls. He ruled out a fractured mandate, or the possibility of Operation Lotus happening again.
“Our party’s internal survey has given these numbers. Voters seen BJP’s misrule and are now expecting clean government from the Congress,” he asserted, at an interaction with reporters at Press Club of Bengaluru on Thursday.
He alleged that CM Basavaraj Bommai had “massacred democracy” by not holding elections to Zilla Panchayats and Taluk Panchayats. He demanded the CM’s resignation as the Karnataka HC has slapped a penalty of Rs 5 lakh on the government for its failure.
On the BJP bringing in Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah extensively for campaigning, Shivakumar ridiculed that the party lacked leadership in the state, so it was banking on central leaders. “We have an able leader in AICC president Mallikarjuna Kharge who knows every nook and corner of the state. We will take a call on which leader will campaign in a specific region,” he said.
He claimed that leaders from rival parties are enthusiastic about joining the Congress ahead of elections. “Revenue Minister R Ashoka may have claimed that there are 10 Congress MLAs who wish to join BJP, but we too have our own list of their party legislators,” he said.
Shivakumar alleged that the state DGP had tweeted that the cooker blast was an act of terrorism, possibly to divert people’s attention from the voter data theft issue. He listed out issues like the ‘40 per cent commission’ which contractors had raised, resignations of KS Eshwarappa and Ramesh Jarkiholi, and maladministration of the Covid-19 pandemic. On being compared with ex-CM SM Krishna as a Vokkaliga leader recently, he quipped, “I have been made party president by the high command with some calculations.”
YELLAPUR BJP LEADER HOPS TO CONGRESS
Bengaluru: Former BJP MLA from Yellapur VS Patil and his supporters on Thursday joined the Congress in the presence of state Congress president DK Shivakumar, former chief minister Siddaramaiah and former minister RV Deshpande.
Shivakumar told reporters that Patil had received the best MLA award when APJ Abdul Kalam was President. He had contested the 2013 and 2018 elections as a BJP candidate, and lost the last elections with a narrow margin of 1,480 votes, he said.
Patil was BJP state executive committee member and chairman of Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC). After some Congress leaders joined BJP, ruling party leaders in those assembly segments are joining the Congress, Shivakumar said.
Applications from many leaders wanting to join the party are pending, he said. Shivakumar said he and Siddaramaiah will together visit 20 districts that were not covered during the Bharat Jodo Yatra, after which they will visit all 224 assembly segments separately.