The former Prime Minister and Janata Dal (Secular) president H.D. Deve Gowda in separate letters to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Governor H.R. Bhardwaj has urged them to invoke the constitutional mechanism available with them against the State Government for restoring law and order, especially in Bellary district.
Releasing copies of the letters at a press conference, Mr. Gowda requested Dr. Singh and Mr. Bhardwaj to take steps for reining in Revenue Minister G. Karunakara Reddy, Infrastructure and Tourism Minister G. Janardhan Reddy and Health and Family Welfare Minister B. Sriramulu, also mine owners, as Chief Minister B.S. Yeddyurappa's writ does not run in the district.
Mr. Gowda, who demanded dismissal of the Yeddyurappa Government and imposition of President's Rule on Monday following the attack on Tapal Ganesh, a mine owner and two TV journalists in Bellary, said that there was complete breakdown of constitutional machinery in the State. Not even a semblance of rule of law existed in Bellary district, he added.
Intervention sought
Mr. Gowda said that the Government was not only a mute spectator to the horrendous incidents taking place in the district and elsewhere, but also one could see its complicity in the crimes, through its inaction, which called for intervention by both the Centre as well as the Governor.
He asked Dr. Singh to call for a report from Mr. Bhardwaj on the situation prevailing in the State, especially in Bellary district.
He alleged that the Reddy brothers had ceded a part of the State to Andhra Pradesh, violating the State's territorial integrity.
The JD (S) supremo, who had narrated the incident of attack on Mr. Ganesh and violation of human rights of V. Anjaneya, Deputy General Manager (Mines) in the Obulapuram Mining Company by the Bellary district police, as substantiated by the order passed by the State Human Rights Commission, in his letters alleged that the Government had failed to shift the Police Superintendent Seemant Kumar Singh.
Mr. Singh, who was transferred recently, was reinstated after 17 days, following a truce between the groups led by Mr. Yeddyurappa and the Reddy brothers which was brokered by Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha Sushma Swaraj, he added.
‘Yeddyurappa helpless'
Asked, why he was not demanding action against the Additional Chief Secretary (Home) and Director-General and Inspector-General of Police for their failure to implement the State Human Rights Commission order to shift the SP and was insisting on invoking the constitutional mechanism to rein in the Government, Mr. Gowda said both Mr. Yeddyurappa and Home Minister V.S. Acharya had expressed their ‘helplessness' on many occasions.
He said that Dr. Acharya was so helpless that he could not transfer even a police constable and it was done elsewhere.
Mr. Gowda warned that if the Reddy brothers were not stopped from continuing their reign of terror in the district, it would spread to other parts of the State.
