Bengaluru: Posing a challenge to state BJP president B.S. Yeddyurappa, Water Resources Minister D.K. Shivakumar on Sunday dared him to topple the coalition government in the state.
Speaking to reporters here, Mr Shivakumar quipped, “I think he (Mr Yeddyurappa) is day-dreaming a lot these days. I have seen him repeating the same threat (of toppling the government) in the last several months. Each time we ensured that he failed. He may have succeeded in taking away one of our legislators but that will not last long.”
The minister added that the state government and key leaders of the coalition were aware of Mr Yeddyurappa's tactics of using his links with some contractors, businessmen and bureaucrats to send feelers to disgruntled MLAs in the Congress party. “We have collected enough evidence to prove that he is actively involved in planning and executing Operation Lotus in the state. We will expose him soon,” he warned. Taking a swipe at former chief minister, Jagadish Shettar who had described him as a "paper tiger,” Mr Shivakumar said, “I am neither a tiger nor paper. I am just a worker of my party. I go wherever my party assigns me a task and do my job.”
