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Former chief minister Jagadish Shettar today demanded an apology from chief minister Siddaramaiah for the latter’s remark over the suicide of a farmer in front of the Suvarna Vidhana Soudha in Belgaum when the legislative session was on.
Speaking to reporters after the road show in Dharwad on Sunday, Shettar said, Siddaramaiah’s remark that farmer Vithal Arabhavi had died of alcohol smacked of irresponsibility.
“It shows the chief minister’s apathy towards farmers. The state government had ordered an inquiry into the suicide of far- mer Vithal Arabhavi and the report should have reached the government by now. Let the CM make public the contents of the report” Shettar challenged.
He said, farmers were resorting to extreme steps like suicide as the present government had failed to mitigate their problems.
Shettar ridiculed MLC Veeranna Mattikatti for endorsing the remark made by Siddaramaiah.
On the Cobrapost sting that nailed the Sangha Parivar and BJP for demolition of Babri Masjid and releasing the contents of the ‘sting operation’, Shettar said, the demolition had taken place 24 years ago and the matter was in the court of law. Cobrapost is raking up the issue at the time of election to split votes, he said.
Shettar was also critical of Congress leaders raising personal issues while campaigning and said that it was a desperate attempt on the part of the Congress which was sensing defeat in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections.
He refused to comment on Sri Ram Sena chief Pramod Mutalik’s utterences and said Mutalik was also a candidate and was doing his job.
He pointed to the pre-poll surveys conducted by various agencies in sync with TV channels and said all surveys had predicted a clean sweep for the BJP-led NDA. In Karnataka the BJP will bag more than 20 seats, he asserted.
Earlier, Shettar along with MLA Arvind Bellad, mayor Shivu Hiremath, former MLA Seema Masuti, corporator Vijayanand Shetty, Prakash Godbole, Iresh Anchatageri and other leaders participated in the road show which began at Kadapa Maidan and went through the main roads.
Shettar asked voters to support the BJP to bring a change in the national scenario.
