Bengaluru: Union Minister and JD(S) state president H D Kumaraswamy on Tuesday said Home Minister Priyank Kharge is unfit to run the Home Department, as he continued his attack over the investigation into the sting operation case.
Speaking to reporters at the party headquarters, JP Bhavan, Kumaraswamy said the Home Department, the powers of the office and the intelligence wing are all with Kharge, yet Kharge was asking him for evidence. “Can such a person be called Home Minister?” he asked, adding that Kharge lacked the ability to hold such a responsible portfolio.
Allegations on the sting probe
- Kumaraswamy alleged that a murder had taken place, that the killers were let off along with those who filmed it, and that police were showing their might against those who had raised an alarm about the murder.
- He asked where the email that the victim had sent to the Child Rights Commission, when Kripa Alva was its chairperson, had gone, and whether Kharge had kept it or deleted it. He said Kharge now questions what the email has to do with the probe.
- He said Kharge held a different portfolio when the email was received and now holds the Home portfolio, and asked that those who saw the email at the time be investigated. He questioned why the matter was being described as outside the minister’s purview.
- He said the investigation was being derailed by pressure from the Chief Minister and the Home Minister and that the police were dancing to their tune, and asked that the probe be set right.
Remarks on Siddaramaiah and the Congress
Asked about reports that former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah had warned the party high command, Kumaraswamy said he had information that Siddaramaiah had warned the leadership firmly and that, according to reports, Siddaramaiah had asked Rahul Gandhi whether he should be there in 2028. Kumaraswamy said Siddaramaiah had repeatedly demanded the arrest of those behind the sting and that he was saying the same thing.
He said he had fought against Siddaramaiah politically and was not speaking out of sympathy for him, nor out of jealousy over a member of his community being Chief Minister, but out of distress at the state’s condition. He alleged that some in the Congress had finished off Siddaramaiah and were now pursuing a new kind of politics, and said the people would decide in 2028.
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