Leader of the Opposition Siddaramaiah slammed the B S Yediyurappa administration Friday, saying he gave it “zero” marks for its functioning in the first 100 days.
“What are the government’s achievements anyway,” he asked, during an interaction with reporters here, while hitting out at the ruling BJP for its handling of the flood
situation.
“Yediyurappa is the weakest CM. He didn’t even try to get relief from the Centre. The BJP has 25 MPs, and he neither took them to the Centre nor did he take an all-party delegation. The Centre has given Rs 1,200 crore against the government’s flood damage estimate of Rs 35,000 crore, that too 60 days after the disaster,” Siddaramaiah said.
The first 100 days of the Yediyurappa administration has not seen any development, Siddaramaiah said. “Transfers, getting MLAs to resign and re-allocation of funds given to Congress, JD(S) MLAs are all that this government has done these 100 days,” he said. “Only Yediyurappa can pat his own back.”
Targeting the government on the flood situation, Siddaramaiah demanded Yediyurappa to explain why nearly 50,000 households were yet to get compensation for their damaged homes. “The government’s memorandum to the Centre says 2,47,628 homes were damaged in the floods. But in an advertisement, the government says 97,000 homes. What’s the truth?” he said.
Dubbing the government as “illegitimate”, Siddaramaiah said Yediyurappa did not have a majority in the Assembly. “Out of 224 seats, the BJP has 106, including the support of one Independent. They are still short of 7-8 seats. So, what will be the political scenario if the BJP doesn’t win 7-8 seats in the bypolls? Yediyurappa will have to resign and we may face fresh polls,” he said.
The Congress, which has already announced its candidates for eight out of the 15 constituencies facing bypolls, is confident of winning at least 12 seats, Siddaramaiah said. “We have already started our campaign. We will intensify it after the Supreme Court decision on the disqualified MLAs.”
Siddaramaiah also clarified he had no squabble with former minister D K Shivakumar. “We have no differences. There are no differences within the party also. Well, there are differing opinions, but nothing that will hurt the party,” he said.
