Bengaluru: Former Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa on Friday gave an ultimatum to the state government saying his party would hold demonstrations if the Siddaramaiah administration did not fulfill its five guarantees before the State Assembly session begins on July 3.
The BJP stalwart said if the government failed to fulfill its promises, then his party will stage demonstrations inside and outside the Karnataka Assembly.
“Our MLAs will stage demonstrations inside the Assembly. We have 65 MLAs, which is not a small number. Outside, those candidates who lost the election will stage a demonstration at the Mahatma Gandhi’s statue,” Yediyurappa said.
He added that the demonstrations in which he too would participate will start from 10 am to 5 pm on the day the Assembly session starts and go on till the day it ends.
The BJP leader alleged that the Congress government came to power by making false promises in the name of the five guarantees. “Other than Shakti scheme providing free bus travel to women, none of the other schemes have been implemented. This means that they betrayed people and came to power through the back door,” Yediyurappa charged.
Reacting to his remarks, Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar said Indian democracy has given every right to Yediyurappa to stage a demonstration.
However, Shivakumar pointed out that during the previous BJP government, Yediyurappa had got cases registered against him and other senior Congress leaders for leveling charges against ministers who allegedly took bribes from contractors.
The Deputy Chief Minister also appealed to him to go through the manifesto prepared by the state as well as the central unit. “Ours is just a month-old government but what did you say in your manifesto? You said you will double everyone’s income. You also said you will give two crore jobs to youths. You also said that you will bring back black money and give everyone Rs 15 lakh. This way you made 500 promises and fulfilled only 50 of them,” he said.
He said now the BJP in Karnataka cannot fulfill its promises because it is not in the government as people rejected them here.
Besides Shakti, the four other guarantees are ‘Gruha Jyoti’ offering up to 200 units free power for household connections, ‘Gruha Lakshmi’ promising Rs 2,000 to women head of APL/BPL families, Anna Bhagya scheme offering 10 kg rice to each member of BPL families and Yuva Nidhi offering Rs 3,000 and Rs 1,500 to the graduates and diploma holders who graduated this year.
The process of implementing the Gruha Jyoti has begun but the government is struggling to procure rice for the Anna Bhagya scheme.
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