Siddaramaiah: Congress will bring Yettinahole water to four parched districts

Tumakuru: Making it clear that the Congress was committed to providing drinking water to the parched districts of Tumakuru, Chikkaballapur, Kolar, Chitradurga and Bengaluru rural districts through the Yettinahole project, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Monday came down heavily on Janata Dal (Secular) leader, H.D. Kumaraswamy for implying otherwise.

The Chief Minister, who was speaking at an election rally, “Gram Swaraj” here, said his government had sanctioned Rs 13 crore for the project and had already spent Rs 3,000 crore on it.

“Believe that we will give you drinking water,” he told the people. Claiming the JD(S) had no leg to stand on on the issue, he maintained the party would lose even its deposits in the three constituencies of Devdurga, Hebbal and in Bidar.

Taking on the Bharatiya Janata Party as well, he said it did not believe in decentralization of power and voting for it would amount to voting against democracy and the panchayat raj system. In his enthusiasm to hit out at the Prime Minister, Mr Siddaramaiah referred to Mr Narendra Modi as “Moily-yavare” in Kannada, correcting himself quickly as Congress workers laughed at his faux pas.

Going on to list the Congress’ achievements he said, “We amended laws to give power to villagers, and now we have taken a decision to give Cabinet rank to Zilla Panchayat presidents and reservation for SCs, STs, BCs, minorities and women in the three-tier panchayat raj system, benefiting thousands from the farming community and tail-end people.”

Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Mallikarjun Kharge, who also addressed the rally, spoke in a similar vein giving all credit to the Congress for decentralization of power in the state.

“You will be encouraging a communal party and supporting RSS principles if you vote for the BJP,” he warned.