CM, DVS in bitter twitter war over 'jail bird' taunt

A day after BJP national president Amit Shah said 'Siddaramaiah' and 'corruption' were synonymous, a twitter war broke out between the Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and Union Minister D V Sadananda Gowda on Friday.

Shah, who attacked the Siddaramaiah-led government at the BJP rally in Mysuru on Thursday, also tweeted that the Congress government had "crossed all limits of corruption".

In reply to Shah's tweet, Siddaramaiah said that the BJP leader was making outdated speeches and was ill informed about the Mahadayi issue.

Siddaramaiah followed this with his 'jail bird' taunt. "Says an ex-jail bird who chose another former jail bird to be his party's CM candidate for our Karnataka election. Can he present facts about the so called corruption charges against me or my Govt? Just telling lies won't help. People will not believe his jumlas (lies)," he tweeted.

Here, Siddaramaiah was referring to Shah's imprisonment in the Sohrabuddin Sheikh encounter case and BJP state president B S Yeddyurappa's imprisonment in the denotification case.

It was at this juncture that Sadananda Gowda jumped into the fray and tweeted, "Congress (I) was formed by ex jail bird who became ex prime minister of the country for corruption. Her son ex prime minister would have permanently remained as jail bird for Bofors corruption. But, sadly your party sponsored terrorism assassinated him. Need more list sir?"

The ex-prime minister Gowda referring to was Indira Gandhi and her son Rajiv Gandhi. While Indira was imprisoned for the Emergency excesses; her son, according to Gowda, would have served a jail term in the Bofors scam, if not for his death.

Later, Siddaramaiah and Gowda sparred in Kannada.

Siddaramaiah: "Can the Union Minister for Statistics, who is defending his national president Amit Shah, explain how his (Shah) son's property increased 16,000 times over in just three years?"

Gowda: "Since you have tabled several budgets, I thought you knew the difference between annual turnover and net profit. You are dependent on your lackey for state intelligence. Little wonder that you are making such ill informed statements."

Siddaramaiah: "From Railway Ministry to Law Ministry to Statistics Ministry. This is the reward given to you by your prime minister and party president. What does your future hold if you don't support Shah?"

Gowda: "I treat both my mother and my party equally. It is my responsibility to discharge my duty as a loyal party worker. Posts are irrelevant. You will not understand this as you are not indebted to the party that groomed you. Nothing in this world is permanent. You already know this."