Bengaluru: Charging that the state government was a cesspool of corruption, BJP State President B.S. Yeddyurappa has demanded an explanation from Chief Minister Siddaramaiah over the alleged diary entries made by a Congress MLC on payoffs made by him to the Congress high command. He also wondered why SSI minister Ramesh Jarkiholi was continuing in his post despite Income Tax raids on him.
Speaking to reporters here on Sunday, Mr Yeddyurappa said the Chief Minister, who had lost the moral right to continue in power, should explain his stance on these two issues during the ongoing Legislature session with his party planning an adjournment motion.
“I stand by my earlier allegation that the Chief Minister paid Rs 1,000 crore to the Congress high command for staying in power, through MLC Govindaraju. During a recent raid on the MLC’s house, IT officials had seized a dairy, where there was a mention of Rs 65 crore paid to push the steel bridge project. Mr Govindaraju, citing the Sahara case in the Supreme Court, has said that the diary entries cannot be considered proof in a court of law. Is it not an admission by the MLC about the transaction?” he asked.
On the IT raids on Minister Ramesh Jarkiholi's residence which unearthed '116 crore in assets disproportionate to his known sources of income, Mr Yeddyurappa remarked that such people cannot stay in power for more than 24 hours and yet, Mr Jarkiholi was clinging to his post. Denying the Congress charge that he received information on the controversial diary entry from the Enforcement Directorate, Mr Yeddyurappa said a number of Congress legislators and senior officials themselves call him up to provide information.
“Name any department, there is corruption. In Kushtagi in Koppal district, works worth over Rs 42 crore were done without floating tenders. After an investigation proved this, two junior officials were suspended. Former minister Shivaraj Tangadagi is behind this but no action was initiated against him,” he said.
Minister Vinay Kulakarni has admitted in the Legislative Council that every day, around 800 loads of M-sand from Tamil Nadu enter Karnataka illegally. This means an evasion of around Rs 6 lakh revenue. “Who is getting all this money?” he asked.
Mr Yeddyurappa said he had directed Mr B.J. Puttaswamy and other leaders to move an adjournment motion in the Council on Monday regarding corruption. When it was pointed out that the CM was contemplating legal action against him for making baseless allegations, the BJP chief quipped that the CM must do exactly that. “In the coming days, he will realise what other information is hidden in the dairy, which has details of payments to central leaders.” he added.
