Rein in MLAs airing grievances in public: Venugopal to Siddaramaiah

New Delhi: Expressing displeasure over MLAs airing their grievances about the style of functioning of the government, Congress general secretary (organisation) K C Venugopal on Wednesday told Chief Minister Siddaramaiah to ensure such things do not recur, party sources said.

The CM, who was in the national capital on official work, called on Venugopal and held discussions with him for more than half an hour. 

The meeting gains significance amid Aland MLA B R Patil making corruption charges in allotment of houses to poor in the housing department. 

The CM had met Congress president Mallikarjuna Kharge and general secretary (incharge of Karnataka) Randeep Surjewala on Tuesday.

During the meeting, Venugopal reportedly expressed displeasure over Patil going to the media with his complaint against Housing Minister B Z Zameer Ahmed Khan.

He also referred to the party’s Sagar MLA Belur Gopalkrishna speaking to the media on the issue and Kagwad MLA Raju Kage’s statement on “administrative collapse”.  

The Congress top leader told the CM to speak to these MLAs and ‘rein them in’ immediately.

Venugopal told the CM that the party would not tolerate leaders going public with their grievances. He asked the CM to address their concerns, sources said.

The CM assured Venugopal that he would speak to all disgruntled leaders and assuage their feelings, sources
said.

On pending nominations to the Legislative Council, Venugopal told the CM that a decision would be taken once Congress senior leader Rahul Gandhi returned from foreign trip, sources said.

CM Siddaramaiah on Wednesday held separate talks with disgruntled lawmakers BR Patil and Raju Kage.

He also spoke with Housing Minister Zameer Ahmed Khan whose department was accused of bribery by Patil. Before meeting the CM, Patil met DCM D K Shivakumar. Sources said Siddaramaiah heard both Patil and Kage, the latter slammed the government over the lack of grants. The CM is said to have assured the lawmakers of looking into their grievances while advising them not to wash dirty linen in public.