Janata Dal (S) supremo H.D. Deve Gowda on Friday accused the BJP and Congress of being responsible for the communal violence on the state's coast, claiming that if one was carrying the fuel, the other had the match to ignite it. A Sangh parivar activist and a minority community member were killed in recent violence.
Speaking to reporters, he said the tranquility of the coast had badly deteriorated and the situation had sunk to a new low. "We have never seen anything like this before," he maintained, blaming both the BJP and Congress for the sufferings of the innocent people of the region.
"Why is this happening when the Congress party is in power and why not when H D Kumarswamy ruled the state?" he asked, asserting, " If peace has return to the state then the JDS must be voted to power."
Attacking the Congress party some more, he claimed it was indulging in soft Hindutva as evident by its president, Rahul Gandhi's visits to numerous Hindu temples during the recent Gujarat Assembly polls. But the JD(S) was neither soft nor hard on Hindutva, he said.
As for Chief Minister Siddaramaiah's contention that his government had fulfilled 155 of the 165 promises made to the people in the run-up to the 2013 election that saw it come to power, Mr Gowda responded with sarcasm, "If all poll promises have been fulfilled , what else remains now?"
The JD(S) leader said he would announce the list of his party candidates for the coming Assembly polls after sorting out the differences on their selection within the party.
