Bengaluru: Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Monday came down heavily on Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) national president Amit Shah for describing his government as the most corrupt governments in the country. It may be recalled that Amit Shah on Sunday blasted Siddaramaiah government for rampant corruption in the state while addressing the convention of backward classes organized by the BJP state unit at Palace Grounds.
Speaking on the sidelines of the three-day BengaluruITI.biz at Palace Grounds, the chief minister said that BJP national president Amit Shah has no moral right to comment on Karnataka. “Amit Shah is an accused in one of the murder cases. Shah would have been in prison if Narendra Modi had not become the Prime Minister. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) officials had helped Shah to remain outside due to some reasons,’’ the chief minister said.
Criticising BJP national president for describing Karnataka as the most corrupt states in the country, the chief minister said he should have thought twice before making such comment on the state. “I am surprised to see Amit Shah sharing the dais with the people who gone to prison on corruption charges and those who possessed currency counting machines at their residence,’’ he said.
Stating that he was not against demonetization, the chief minister said the problem with the implementation of demonetization was lack of preparations before announcing it. “It had impacted the common man and certainly not those who have black money. Have you ever seen any rich person standing in the queue in front of an ATM or a bank? It is the common man who is suffering by standing in a long queue to draw his hard-earned money from the ATMs,’’ he said.
Coming down heavily on BJP activists distributing sweets on successfully implementing demonetization programme, the chief minister wondered how the BJP leaders could distribute sweets to people while the common man, petty business people and daily wagers have been suffering a lot due to non-availability of currency notes.
