BENGALURU: Former Chief Minister and JD(S) state president H D Kumaraswamy on Thursday alleged that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah orchestrated the fall of the JD(S)-Congress government in 2019 by joining hands with the BJP.
“It was Siddaramaiah who brought down the coalition government led by me. There is no doubt about it. I said that the BJP had brought down the government. But it was Siddaramaiah who sowed the seeds for this,” he told media persons.
He claimed that he has no enmity with former minister Ramesh Jarkiholi, who had led the mission to bring down the government, but had asked Siddaramaiah to fix the issue of Belagavi politics which the latter did not do as he wanted the government to collapse. “Then Siddaramaiah joined hands with the BJP,” he said.
“Siddaramaiah made two independent MLAs as ministers though I asked him to make B C Patil a minister. It was Siddaramaiah who sent Srimanta Patil and R Shankar from the resort,” he alleged.
Responding to Siddaramaiah’s remarks that Kumaraswamy is his enemy, the latter, “Yes, I am a political villain of Siddaramaiah. Who said no? I cannot be his friend.”
“I never had fun at a hotel, but discussed development works for which I have all the documents,” he claimed on allegations by Siddaramaiah that Kumaraswamy ran the government from a hotel when he was CM.
Kumaraswamy regretted that Congress leaders insulted him by treating him like a “puppet”, not giving respect for the CM’s post he held for 14 months.
The JD(S) leader criticised the Congress as to why it promised to give Rs 10,000 to women under the Griha Lakshmi scheme in poll-bound Rajasthan. “The Congress is giving guarantees everywhere. Because of this, all development works have taken a backseat. There will be a time in future when people will dismiss your guarantees,” he said.
‘Ready to take truth test in Dharmasthala’
Kumaraswamy accepted Magadi MLA Balakrishna’s challenge to take truth test in Dharmasthala stating that his family did not make ill-gotten money in politics. But he asked the CM, Dy CM and their cabinet colleagues to take a truth test that they did not make money in the transfer of officials in the last five months’ tenure of the Congress government.
“JDS patriarch H D Deve Gowda never thought about the future of his children in his political career. We have not earned money illegally. Let the state government investigate and confiscate the money if it was earned illegally,” he said.
‘Will launch hunger strike’
Kumaraswamy said he would never allow the renaming of Ramanagara district as Bengaluru South even if it costs his life. He will launch a hunger strike if Shivakumar goes ahead with his plan to rename Ramanagara as Bengaluru South district. “I am not keeping well. It does not matter even if I lose my life. I will not let them rename Ramanagara as Bengaluru South district. I will seek people’s cooperation for my struggle,” Kumaraswamy said.
He sought to know why Shivakumar did not oppose when he created Ramanagara district 17 years ago. “Why didn’t you object then? Why this sudden move to create Bangalore South district?” he questioned Shivakumar.