BENGALURU: Union Minister for Steel and Heavy Industries HD Kumaraswamy on Sunday alleged that Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar will soon go to jail for the alleged misdeeds he committed in land deals.
Virtually addressing a rally of farmers, organised to oppose the Bidadi Township, from New Delhi, Kumaraswamy lashed out at Shivakumar for launching “a false propaganda that the township was the initiative of the Deve Gowda family”. He said, “Not even an inch of farmers’ land will be allowed to be acquired for the township.”
He said, “They (Shivakumar and others) cannot finish off JDS as farmers and God are with us. Everyone knew the conspiracy Shivakumar hatched to finish off my family. Days are not far for Shivakumar to go to jail.”
He said, “It is deeply disturbing that the very person who has repeatedly exploited the land of the poor and farmers is now making frivolous remarks about me. As a farmer myself, I have built my life in Bidadi. Unlike him, I have not built schools, colleges or high-rise complexes on land taken away from the poor.”
Kumaraswamy also alleged that Shivakumar had encroached upon land acquired in Hosakerehalli for the NICE Road project, as well as large tracts of land taken during SM Krishna’s tenure under the Bengaluru-Mysuru Expressway project.
“It has been more than 20 years, yet no road has been built. That land is now being misused. By contrast, when I was CM, the Bengaluru-Mysuru highway was completed swiftly, and compensation was promptly given to farmers who lost land,” he claimed.