Basavaraj Bommai to Congress: End fight, focus on good governance

BENGALURU: Taking a dig at Congress over the ongoing tussle between DK Shivakumar and Siddaramaiah for the chief minister’s post, outgoing CM Basavaraj Bommai on Wednesday asked the leadership to focus on ensuring good governance.

“Delay in selection of the CM despite having the full majority shows a lack of unity in Congress. Though it is an internal issue and they would not like to talk about it, the Congress must stop playing politics, select a new CM, and focus on serving the people,” he said.

Referring to the Congress’ allegation that Lingayats were being neglected by the BJP ahead of the elections, Bommai said let him see what posts the former gives to the community in the new government.

BJP MLA Araga Jnanendra also criticised the Congress over the delay and urged the party to implement five big promises it made to the people before elections. “People are waiting for your guarantees. End your fight and fulfil promises,” he said.

‘Siddaramaiah to blame for coalition govt fall’

Even as Siddaramaiah is bargaining hard with the high command for a second tenure as the CM, former ministers K Sudhakar and ST Somashekhar indirectly held him responsible for toppling the Congress-JD(S) coalition government, alleging that, as the coordination committee chairman, the former CM played a crucial role in making the MLAs resign and join the BJP. “Whenever Congress MLAs went to him with their concerns, Siddaramaiah used to tell them to wait till the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, and come what may, he won’t allow HD Kumaraswamy to continue even for a single day,” Sudhakar tweeted.

“Some of us had to inevitably quit Congress and go back to the people in byelections. Can Siddaramaiah deny the fact that he had no role, implicitly or explicitly, in this move by Congress MLAs?” he asked. Somashekhar, one of the Congress MLAs who shifted to the BJP, seconded Sudhakar’s opinion. “Despite being chairman of the coordination committee, Siddaramaiah always expressed helplessness to address the concerns of MLAs. No one can deny the truth that this pushed some of us to quit the party and go to the polls,” he tweeted.

However, former minister MTB Nagaraj dismissed the claims. “Will Sudhakar take an oath on his family deity and say Siddaramaiah instigated MLAs to join the BJP? Sudhakar is making such allegations out of frustration. If not, why was he silent all these days?” he asked.