Distancing himself from the statements of senior Congress leaders Shamanur Shivashankarappa and M B Patil in support of Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa, former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Wednesday said he would speak to both the party leaders and enquire about the context of their statements.
Leader of Opposition in Karnataka in Legislative Assembly, who was here to meet Congress former President Rahul Gandhi, also said, “I will not subscribe to what our leaders said. Both the leaders should not have spoken like that.”
D K Suresh, Bengaluru Rural Lok Sabha MP also said they must have spoken in personal capacity under the pressure from their community, but I hope they will correct their statements in the coming days.
Shamanur Shivashankarappa, president of the All-India Veerashiva Mahasabha and also Congress MLA from Davangere South, met Yediyurappa on Monday and said the Veerashaiva community was firmly behind him. “Any effort to dislodge him would not go well with the community," he said.
Reacting to these statements, Suresh said that both leaders' statements were not Congress's opinion.
Congress leaders in Delhi were of the view that the statements by both Shivashankarappa and Patil were uncalled for. Congress should focus on exposing the misdeeds of the BJP-led government, instead of supporting Yediyurappa leadership, said a party leader.
The Congress government headed by Siddaramaiah in 2018 faced severe criticism from Veerashaiva-Lingayat community leaders when the government decided to give a separate religion tag to the community.
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(Published 21 July 2021, 14:15 IST)
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