Bangalore: Taking the Opposition parties
head on, a combative Karnataka Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa
on Wednesday said defamation suits would be slapped against JDS
leader H D Kumaraswamy and Leader of Opposition Congress in
the Assembly Siddaramaiah for levelling "false allegations"
against him.
Minutes after Kumaraswamy addressed a press conference
in New Delhi targeting him, Yeddyurappa told reporters here
that he would file the case. He dismissed the allegations of
Kumaraswamy, son of JDS supremo H D Deve Gowda, as "baseless"
and "not true" lacking any valid evidence.
Yeddyurappa said he would issue a detailed press
release tomorrow (to rebut the charges) or at the earliest.
The chief minister also announced that a "charge
sheet" against Deve Gowda, Kumaraswamy and their family
members would be released in New Delhi in two-three days.
He said defamation case would also be filed against
Siddaramaiah, who had alleged yesterday that Yeddyurappa and
his family members have evaded income tax to the tune of Rs
339.54 crore and urged the Centre to institute a probe.
Yeddyurappa accused the Opposition of raising repeated
allegations against him so that the BJP "should not question"
vis-a-vis 2G, Adarsh Housing and other scams.
He said the Opposition Congress and JDS were
repeatedly raising allegations because they realise that if
the BJP government continued to function as it had been doing
in the past three years, people would forget the parties`
names.
Yeddyurappa, flanked by Cabinet colleagues, slammed
the Congress for its booklet "Congress Nadige-Janara Balige"
(Congress Journey towards the People) which, he said, contains
"mostly half-truths and irrelevant information".
He released a 15-page point-by-point rebuttal to the
Congress booklet. Releasing the government`s clarification
titled "Clarity in Stand: Performance Aplenty", he said his
attempt is to counter the "sinister attempt of influencing the
people of the State to believe the mis-information as truth".
Yeddyurappa said in the Congress booklet, it had been
portrayed as though the Karnataka government was depending
upon Central grants for its plan expenditure and failed in
mobilising resources.
"The actual fact is that the state`s share forms a
part and parcel of the Centrally-sponsored schemes. It`s not
begging. We are not seeking alms," he said. "Another thing to
be noted here is that the Central grants are nothing but a
portion of taxes collected by the Centre from the states."
Training his guns on the Congress-led UPA, Yeddyurappa
said the Centre was neglecting areca nut growers of the state.
"Despite yellow leaf disease and other losses to recant
growers, the Centre failed to declare minimum support price",
the Chief Minister charged.
Yeddyurappa also alleged that the Centre was neglecting
palm growers, "suffering due to abolition of import levy on
palm oil. Also the Central Government has not yet responded to
our request for a minimum support price".
He charged the Centre with double standards in the area
of health, saying while other states were being provided
central grants under National Rural Health Mission in the
ratio of 1:2, Karnataka was getting it only 1:1.
"Is this justified?" he said.
The chief minister accused the central government of not
cooperating with the state in allocating coal and gas for new
projects, adding, it`s only giving "lame excuses". "This has
become an impediment to start new power projects".
PTI
