BENGALURU: Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Tuesday hit out at the BJP for seeking his resignation over the stampede outside the M Chinnaswamy Stadium on June 4, which claimed 11 lives.
Siddaramaiah asked the BJP to first release a list of its leaders who resigned owing responsibility after similar incidents in the past, including the recent Ahmedabad plane crash, collapse of a pedestrian suspension bridge in Morbi, Gujarat, and the stampede during the Kumbh Mela in Uttar Pradesh.
“The incident that happened outside Chinnaswamy Stadium is a tragedy. As a responsible government, we have ordered a probe, and action has been taken. While we have taken these many steps, the BJP is demanding my resignation. They are politicising the tragedy. They have no concern for people,’’ the CM said.
The BJP on Tuesday staged a protest in Bengaluru seeking the resignation of CM Siddaramaiah and Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar in connection with the stadium stampede.
He said that the BJP plays politics over dead bodies, and it is their old habit. Siddaramaiah said that his government knows the pain of the families of the stampede victims, and that is why the Congress is not politicising the incident.
Recalling the Godhra train carnage that resulted in communal riots in Gujarat in 2002, Siddaramaiah said that the then PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee had asked the then Gujarat CM Narendra Modi to resign.
“Modi neither resigned nor expressed any regret. BJP leaders, who are demanding our resignations, should question their own leaders about this,” the CM said, asking the BJP leader why they did not seek PM Modi’s resignation after the recent Pahalgam terrorist attack.
“My party wanted a special session of the Parliament to discuss the matter... but PM Modi refused. The Union Government has failed to nab the four terrorists who killed innocent tourists. Who should take responsibility for this?’’ he asked the BJP leaders.
He sought to know from the BJP who was responsible for the stampede during the Kumbh Mela in Prayagraj and the air crash in Ahmedabad and who resigned for it.
Saying that the unrest in Manipur has been going on for the last two years, the CM said that the then Chief Minister of the state from the BJP, N Biren Singh, did not resign immediately but quit only after the Supreme Court intervened. “The unrest still continues in Manipur. Why hasn’t Home Minister Amit Shah resigned?” the CM asked BJP leaders.
