Bengaluru, Jul 2 (PTI): Karnataka BJP president B Y Vijayendra on Wednesday claimed that senior Congress leader Randeep Singh Surjewala arrived in the state to "prepare grounds" for Chief Minister Siddaramaiah's resignation.
The state’s administrative machinery has collapsed and governance is in disarray. Infighting among Congress legislators is worsening, and development work has come to a standstill, he alleged.
"Congress leader Randeep Surjewala is in Bengaluru for the past few days. Why is he here? He is not bothered about the downturn of the corrupt Congress government," Vijayendra told reporters here.
The AICC president is gathering MLAs’ views and is preparing grounds to remove Siddaramaiah from the CM's post. The fight for the top post has intensified due to which horse trading would happen in the state, he claimed.
Referring to Ramnagar MLA Iqbal Ansari’s recent statement that Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar enjoys the support of 100 MLAs and should be made as the CM, the BJP state chief said several senior Congress leaders, including B R Patil and Raju Kage, have also spoken against Siddaramaiah. This shows that the CM has lost the confidence of his own legislators, he said, and urged the Governor to take note of the situation.
He blamed the Congress government for the rising prices of essential commodities and accused it of "rampant corruption and administrative breakdown".
He further stated that the government’s failure has led to a spate of suicides among farmers, officials and contractors. Even Congress MLAs privately acknowledge this dysfunction, he added.
On the Karnataka High Court’s decision to hand over the Valmiki Development Corporation scam to the CBI, Vijayendra termed it as a significant victory for the BJP.
He alleged that the Rs 187 crore meant for the welfare of Scheduled Tribes was diverted to neighbouring Telangana and misused to purchase properties, jewellery and election expenses. Thousands of fake bank accounts were created for this purpose, he said and referred to the suicide of officer Chandrashekhar, who had reportedly detailed the scam in his death note.
Siddaramaiah was compelled to drop Minister B Nagendra from the Cabinet under pressure from the BJP, but efforts are still being made to reinstate him, he claimed.
Nagendra, facing allegations in connection with an illegal money transfer case involving a state-run corporation resigned from the Ministry last June.
Vijayendra alleged that the CM himself is involved in the scam and said no money could have moved out of the state without the approval of the Finance Department, a portfolio held by the CM himself.
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New Delhi (PTI): The Supreme Court on Monday questioned Justice Yashwant Varma over his plea to invalidate an in-house inquiry panel report indicting him over the discovery of huge cache of burnt cash from his official residence during his tenure as a Delhi High Court judge.
"Why did you appear before the inquiry committee? Did you come to the court that the video be removed? Why did you wait for the inquiry to be completed and the report be released? Did you take a chance of a favourable order there first," a bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and A G Masih asked senior advocate Kapil Sibal, who was representing Justice Varma.
The top court further quizzed Justice Varma over the parties he had made in his plea and said he should have filed the in-house inquiry report with his plea.
Sibal submitted there was a process under Article 124 (the Establishment and constitution of the Supreme Court), and a judge couldn't be a subject matter of public debate.
"The release of video on SC website, public furore, media accusations against judges are prohibited as per constitutional scheme," Sibal added.
The top court asked Sibal to come with one page bullet points and correct the memo of parties.
The matter was posted for July 30.
Justice Varma has sought quashing of the May 8 recommendation by then chief justice of India Sanjiv Khanna, urging Parliament to initiate impeachment proceedings against him.
His plea said the inquiry "reversed the burden of proof", requiring him to investigate and disprove the charges levelled against him.
Alleging that the panel's findings were based on a preconceived narrative, Justice Varma said the inquiry timelines were driven solely by the urge to conclude proceedings swiftly, even at the expense of "procedural fairness".
The petition contended that the inquiry panel drew adverse findings without affording him a full and fair hearing.
A report of the inquiry panel probing the incident had said Justice Varma and his family members had covert or active control over the store room where a huge cache of half-burnt cash was found following a fire incident, proving his misconduct which is serious enough to seek his removal.
The three-judge panel headed by Chief Justice Sheel Nagu of the Punjab and Haryana High Court conducted the inquiry for 10 days, examined 55 witnesses and visited the scene of the accidental fire that started at around 11.35 pm on March 14 at the official residence of Justice Varma, then a sitting judge of the Delhi High Court and now in the Allahabad High Court.
Acting on the report, then CJI Khanna wrote to President Droupadi Murmu and Prime Minister Narendra Modi recommending the judge's impeachment.