Narendra Modi flays Congress, JD(S) in Karnataka; PM touches upon corruption, agrarian distress in campaign

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is in the middle of his high-voltage campaign for the BJP in Karnataka, directed his ammunition mostly on the Congress on 2 and 3 May, which was on expected lines. However, there was a marked difference in Modi’s tone as compared to his statements on 1 May with respect to the JD(S). Days after castigating Congress president Rahul Gandhi for “insulting” former prime minister HD Deve Gowda by calling the JD(S) the “B team” of the BJP, Modi on Thursday asked people not to “waste” their votes by backing Gowda’s party as it was going to finish “a poor, distant third” in the elections. JD(S) faces barbs from Modi On 1 May, Modi had said, “I heard the Congress president speak at political rallies 15-20 days ago….the way he referred to respected Deve Gowda_ji_….is this your culture (sanskar)? This is arrogance…Your life (as Congress chief) has just begun. Deve Gowda is among the tallest leaders of the country. You are insulting him.” Two days later, the prime minister was less charitable in his statements about the JD(S). He accused the party of doing a “disservice” by forming an alliance with forces of extremism and communalism. He said it would not win the assembly polls in the state under any circumstances and quoted political pundits, saying they had predicted that Gowda’s party would be a “distant third”, that too after “limping.” While Modi’s more recent remarks were in Bengaluru, his earlier remarks were in Udupi. [caption id=“attachment_4456791” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Narendra Modi in Karnataka. Twitter/@narendramodi[/caption] Modi’s earlier statement about Deve Gowda had led to a flurry of political reactions. Congress spokesperson Anand Sharma alleged there was an “opportunistic understanding and unholy nexus” with the JD(S) that the prime minister and BJP chief Amit Shah had sought and created. Deve Gowda, on his part, had responded to the prime minister’s praise with warmth, saying, “Before the 2014 elections, I had said I would resign from Lok Sabha if BJP gets a majority on its own. I decided to resign, but Modi persuaded me against doing so. He said the country needs the experience and services of senior leaders.” Urban infrastructure Narendra Modi in Bengaluru accused the Siddaramaiah government of having turned the city into a “garbage city and valley of sin” from “Silicon Valley. He said that a talented pool of youngsters in Karnataka made this city the computer capital, but in the last five years, the Congress government turned Bengaluru into a “crime capital.” The youth with entrepreneurial tendency made Bengaluru a startup, but Congress turned it into a “pothole club,” Modi said. The state was given Rs 836 crore by the central government under the ‘Smart City’ project to develop Bengaluru, but the state could spend only Rs 12 crore on the city, he lamented. The cosmopolitan city of Bengaluru was being destroyed by the Congress through its “corruption and culture of chaos”, the prime minister alleged. Of the 224 Assembly segments, the capital city alone has 28 seats. In the 2013 elections, the Congress won 13, BJP 12 and JD-S 3. ‘Karnataka government gold medalist in corruption’ The Karnataka government is a “gold medalist” in corruption and Congress leaders are “drunk on power”, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in Bengaluru. He also flayed the Congress for “insulting” national heroes and the Army. Modi alleged that the Congress had insulted the Indian Army by questioning the truth behind 2016 surgical strikes against terrorists in Pakistan. “After surgical strikes, our Army Chief was called a goon by the Congress. I want to ask you, in our country, has even an uneducated person committed the sin of calling our brave soldiers goons?” He said the Congress was spreading “lies” by accusing the BJP of being anti-Dalit, anti-Muslim and anti-women. “We made a Dalit, the President of India, gave the country its first woman defence minister. They spread lies that we are from the Hindi belt and have nothing to do with the south. But our Vice-President is a south Indian.” He said the BJP gave India a Muslim President in APJ Abdul Kalam and the Congress could not even deliver on making its senior leader Mallikarjun Kharge, the Chief Minister — as promised in the last Assembly election. Farmers’ distress While the BJP has been at the receiving end of anger among the farmer community in several states, it has been on the offensive on the issue in Karnataka. Narendra Modi, during his campaign has repeatedly made references to agrarian distress in the southern state. On 2 May, he came down hard on the Siddaramaiah government in poll-bound Karnataka for being “indifferent” to farm distress and not implementing the crop insurance scheme effectively and stressed that welfare of farmers was his government’s top priority. Assailing the Siddaramaiah government for its alleged failure in tackling drought, Modi said instead of mitigating the suffering of farmers, it gave parched lakes to builders for construction activity. “Helping and serving farmers is an opportunity that comes with good fortune, but the Karnataka government’s game is only to do politics in the name of farmers, instigate them, and spread false information,” he said. Calling BJP’s chief ministerial candidate BS Yeddyurappa a “farmer leader”, Modi said his vast experience and commitment to the farming community will strengthen the Centre’s mission to give a fresh impetus to agriculture. “The people of Karnataka are well aware of Yeddyurappa’s commitment to farmers. The BJP government that will come to power and the BJP government in Delhi that is committed to the cause of farmers will work together to bring a change,” he said. With inputs from agencies