BENGALURU: Union Minister for Steel and Heavy Industries and former chief minister HD Kumaraswamy on Friday hit out at Deputy Chief Minister DK Shivakumar alleging that the latter violated the protocol by conducting meeting with police personnel in Ballari recently.
“We know you are expert in encroaching lands. But now your encroaching the rights of your fellow cabinet minister. Deputy Chief Minister does not have power to conduct meeting with police officials. Only CM and home minister have the power” Kumaraswamy wrote on social media platform ‘X’.
Kumaraswamy said that he was the chief minister of the state twice for a short period and leader of opposition in the Assembly for even shorter time. “At present serving as Union Minister. One need to ask people about our (HDK and Shivakumar) experience in politics’’ he said.
Further, Kumaraswamy said, “You (Shivakumar) might be the Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka. But you should be knowing your power limits. Deputy CM will have the power and protocol like any cabinet ministers. This post is nothing more than that. With your experience, you should be knowing this limitations. At Ballari, the police meeting should have been done by Home Minister, if not CM can chair it. But you have done violation by crossing the power limit. Has the chief minister or the home minister of the state told you to convene the meeting, they have not! Is Home Minister a rubber stamp and incapable?’’ the JDS leader questioned.
Further, Kumaraswamy said his experience is not commission, fixing, extortion, and loot. “I have come as per the people’s mandate and their blessings. With God’s grace, I am here and trying to help people. Otherwise I am not like ‘’You’’. I agree that I am not like you,” he targeted Shivakumar.
