Chief Minister Siddaramaiah has sought to know from the former Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa whether it is wrong to oppose what he calls injustice meted out to the State by the Centre.
Speaking to presspersons in Harihar of Davangere district on Friday, Mr. Siddaramaiah said that when Mr. Yediyurappa was the Chief Minister of the State, he did not raise his voice against the Central government.
“Out of every hundred rupees that goes to the Centre as tax from the State, we get only ₹13. While the tax collection from the State is ₹4,30,000 crore, we are getting back only ₹50,257 crore. We are opposing this stepmotherly treatment of the Centre,” he said.
On drought relief, he said that the State government has already released a temporary relief of ₹2,000 each to 34 lakh farmers which amounted to ₹650 crore. For drinking water, fodder and employment, the Deputy Commissioners have been given ₹860 crore with a direction to them to ensure that the public did not face any hardships due to drought.
“However, even after five months after assessing drought, the Centre has not released any funds towards drought relief. The BJP leaders only make speeches and none is ready to speak to their Central leaders to get the funds released,” he said.
‘Is a political leader?’
Earlier, speaking to presspersons at Hosadurga in Chitradurga district, Mr. Siddaramaiah took exception to the kind of language used by the former Minister K.S. Eshwarappa and wondered whether such a person who says he has been trained in the RSS can spew venom while speaking in public. Can someone who speaks about beating, hacking and shooting people to death be called a political leader, he asked.
“Mr. Eshwarappa does not know any other language than the language of hacking and killing. Action will be taken against him as per law. Does it suit a member of a political party to say that D.K. Suresh should be shot dead,” he said.
To a query, he clarified that not a single rupee has been released by the Union government out of the ₹5,300 crore announced for the Upper Bhadra Project.
