Bengaluru: A function to felicitate newly elected Lok Sabha member of Chikkaballapur seat D. Sudhakar of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has kicked-up a row after organisers of the function distributed alcoholic beverages to the attendees in Nelamangala town outskirts near Bengaluru city on Sunday.
When liquor was served to the attendees, policemen stood mute spectators. The organisers had engaged some people to distribute liquor while the people at the gathering queued up to collect the wine bottles.
D. Sudhakar, as a BJP-JDS consensus nominee, won the Lok Sabha election against his nearest Congress nominee Raksha Ramaiah. In 2023 assembly election, Sudhakar lost to Congress nominee Pradeep Eshwar from Chikkaballapura seat. Sudhakar served as Minister of Health and Family Welfare Services during BJP rule in Karnataka from 2019 to 2023.
It may be recalled that JDS and BJP had an alliance in Karnataka and fought the recently concluded Lok Sabha elections on seat sharing basis. BJP won in 17 seats including D. Sudhakar and JDS won two seats out of 28.
Reacting to distribution of alcoholic beverages at the function, Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar sought an answer from BJP national president J.P. Nadda as to how his party allowed its Lok Sabha member to distribute liquor to its party workers and audience in a public event held on Sunday.
A BJP functionary of Nelamangala told Deccan Chronicle that the liquor (mainly beer of premium quality and some low quality alcoholic beverages) were served to the party workers and audience after the function at the insistence of Janata Dal Secular (JDS) workers.
The BJP functionary said to have served alcoholic beverages to as many as 1,000 persons after the function concluded at about 2.30 pm and stated that the organisers had written permission from officials concerned to serve liquor.
He found nothing wrong in distribution of liquor since no untoward incident occurred after the liquor distribution and explained, “People booze in bars and same liquor bottles were served after the party function. What difference does it make?”.
However, police sources said that no permission was granted by them to serve liquor at the function.
