Siddaramaiah using ACB against his opponents: JD(S) chief H D Kumaraswamy

Bengaluru: State JD(S) chief H D Kumaraswamy lashed out at CM Siddaramaiah on Tuesday for re-opening the 2011 Karnataka Housing Board (KHB) scam and filing a FIR against his party MLA, G T Deve Gowd and 45 others.

Accusing him of misusing the the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) to threaten his political opponents in the run-up to the 2018 Assembly polls, he recalled that the principal secretary, Department of Commerce and Industries had given a clean chit to the KHB in the case.

“Compensation has already been given to farmers, who lost their land near Ilwal and surrounding areas. But not satisfied with this, Mr Siddaramaiah referred the matter to the Lokayukta on January 7, 2014 and now it has been referred to the ACB only to fix our party MLA,” he charged, speaking to reporters here.

The Congress that criticised the BJP at the Centre for “misusing” the CBI and Income Tax department to targets its political rivals was doing the same in Karnataka, he claimed. “The CM and the advisor to Home Minister, Kempaiah held a meeting with the top brass of the ACB and permitted the filing of the FIR against our legislator. Mr Siddaramaiah is resorting to such dirty tricks to humiliate the opposition parties, " he charged, alleging that Mr G T Deve Gowda was being targeted as he had refused to join the Congress.

“You are scared of losing the electoral battle against Mr Deve Gowda but even if you fix and send him to jail, we can get him elected from there too,” he declared, adding that both Mr Siddaramaiah and his son, Dr Yatindra would lose in Chamundeshwari and Varuna constituencies respectively.

Claiming that he had documents on Mr Siddaramaiah’s acts of “ommissions and commissions” he said they would send him to jail after the Assembly polls.