Moily rues ‘ineffective’ governance by coalition govt

Just days after the H D Kumaraswamy administration gave itself a pat on the back for good governance the past one year, senior Congress leader M Veerappa Moily said the government needed to do much more in addressing people’s problems.

“A serious effort is needed on administration and addressing problems faced by people,” Moily told reporters in Chikkaballapur. One of the reasons for the defeat in the recent Lok Sabha elections is that the government did not address people’s problems, he said.

The Congress-JD(S) coalition, Moily said, should have convened a Cabinet meeting to discuss exclusively the Lok Sabha election, which the BJP swept by winning 25 out of the 28 seats in Karnataka.

“Where the government faltered and why we lost should’ve been discussed. But I don’t see any introspection that happened,” he said. The former union minister went on to mock Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy’s grama vastavya (village stay). “It’s not enough for the chief minister or ministers to tour the state.”

Moily’s statement comes as yet another embarrassment to the Congress-JD(S) coalition, after JD(S) legislator A T Ramaswamy resigned recently as chairperson of the Committee on Government Assurances in protest against administrative apathy toward encroachment of public lands.

‘Alliance was a mistake’

The Congress could have won at least 15-16 seats if there was no alliance with the JD(S), Moily said. “It was a mistake trusting the alliance. Our own people were against the alliance.”

Moily lost the Chikkaballapur Lok Sabha seat to BJP’s B N Bachegowda by 1.82 lakh votes.

This is the second time Moily has publicly lamented the party’s decision to fight the Lok Sabha election with the JD(S). A week after the Lok Sabha election results were announced, Moily blamed the JD(S) for his defeat, saying the regional party did not support him and depending on their votes was a mistake.

Moily also said that he would continue to work with the people of Chikkaballapur. “I don’t know if I’ll contest again. I don’t have such an aspiration anyway,” he said.