Bengaluru: The BJP may be attacking Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy's village stay programme, but the Congress is so impressed by it that it wants a slice of the credit and deputy Chief Minister, Dr G Parameshwar has even admitted he wants to hold one of his own as soon as possible.
“I am also going to hold a grama vastavya programme to understand the problems of people in the villages and solve them on the spot,” he said recently, arguing that the credit for the programme must go to both parties as Congress legislators and ministers were participating in the Chief Minister's day-long interaction with villagers in the districts.
A day after his statement, Public Works Minister H.D. Revanna too announced that he would like to follow his brother's example and hold a village stay in at least Hassan district, the stronghold of the Deve Gowda family.
But some Congress leaders believe the grama vastavya programme has been resurrected by the JD(S) to improve Mr Kumaraswamy's image and help the JD(S) too following it dismal performance in the Lok Sabha elections, which has left the party's base in Mumbai-Karnatak and Hyderabad-Karnatak badly dented.
They don't think the JD(S) is in a sharing mood as in 2006 too when Mr Kumaraswamy's village stays were a huge hit, he had preferred to stay in the villages with his party ministers and legislators, and not with the BJP, his party's then coalition partner. The present programme is Mr Kumaraswamy- centric too and not aimed at strengthening the coalition government, they say. “Congress MLAs or ministers need to share the dais with the CM merely as show pieces as everything is handled by Mr Kumaraswamy and his party MLAs,” they add ruefully.
