Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai on Friday hit out at neighbouring Telangana and Tamil Nadu governments for wooing investors of Karnataka and said it clearly showed their “desperate” attempt to attract investment and their campaign against the State “is not in a good taste”.
“Whatever their (neighbouring States’) campaign, nobody can stop Karnataka’s growth. You cannot compare Bengaluru and Karnataka with other States. We are growing on our strength in infrastructure and talented human resources. I will take steps to continue the growth rate,” he said while addressing presspersons here.
After Telangana, Tamil Nadu joined the campaign against Karnataka to welcome entrepreneurs who wanted to move out of the BJP-governed State following raking up of communal issues by some right-wing Hindu outfits.
Tamil Nadu’s Finance Minister Palanivel Thiagarajan said the DMK Government was keeping a watch on the developments in Karnataka as every issue had to be taken seriously.
A few days ago, Telangana’s IT Minister K.T. Rama Rao tweeted entrepreneur Ravish Naresh to “pack your bags & move to Hyderabad”, after the entrepreneur complained about bad roads, power cuts, poor quality of water, and bad footpaths in Bengaluru.
“I am not inviting investors of Telangana and Tamil Nadu to come to Karnataka. The State is regularly receiving a good flow of investment. More global investors will come to the State in the coming days,” Mr. Bommai said. Karnataka is holding a three-day ‘Invest Karnataka’ summit from November 2, 2022.
“Karnataka has been receiving regular investment and the State had received the highest FDI in the country the last three quarters,” he said.
The Chief Minister said attracting investment by criticising other States “is not a good taste”. Both Tamil Nadu and Telangana have expressed their “weakness” to attract investment. “Now both the States are making attempts to develop. Let them develop their own States. I am not against it,” he said.
The Chief Minister also said, “Karnataka is a progressive State and there are attempts to tarnish the image of the State by some vested interests”.
