Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai and Leader of the Opposition in the Legislative Assembly Siddaramaiah have over the last two days engaged in a bitter exchange of barbs on Twitter, with the latter saying the former’s comments provided enough grounds for him to file a defamation case.
It all began with the Chief Minister reacting sharply to Mr. Siddaramaiah’s criticism that he was “handing over law and order to RSS and establishing a Jungle Raj”.
Mr. Bommai’s statements that moral policing in coastal districts has to be seen from the prism of “action and reaction” and such incidents occur when there is moral degradation in society was criticised by many including Mr. Siddaramaiah. Mr. Bommai, reacting to Mr. Siddaramaiah’s criticism, said the latter had become “an icon of anti-Hindus” and went so far as to allege that he had got Hindu activists “killed”. Mr. Siddaramaiah hit back, saying he did not expect such a baseless statements from a Chief Minister.
“I can file a defamation case for this but I will just advise you to correct yourself,” he tweeted.
Earlier, Mr. Bommai invoked the BJP’s 2018 campaign against Mr. Siddaramaiah, who was then Chief Minister, alleging murders of 24 Hindu activists during his time. Mr. Bommai tweeted: “..Jungle Raj was when you were blind, deaf, and dumb to the killings of Hindus under your tenure.”
Mr. Siddaramaiah then tweeted a booklet prepared by the Congress on the deaths of Hindus as well as Muslims during their tenure, countering allegations by the Chief Minister. He called the allegations of Mr. Bommai “a desperate attempt to please his RSS masters”.
Giving the break up of total number of political murders during 2013-18 at 45, he tweeted: “Accused in the murder of 10 Hindus between 2013-18 were from PFI & SDPI. All were arrested. And, accused in the murder of 11 Muslims and 10 Hindus were from Bajrang Dal and Hindu Jagarana Vedike, friends of RSS.”
Reminding the Chief Minister of the BJP’s gaffe of including a living person as one of the murdered workers, he said the Chief Minister should ask the CBI to speed up the probe into the murder of Paresh Mesta and take action against accused in the murders of other Hindu activists as well. He demanded that culprit in the the murder of RTI activist Vinayaka Baliga be brought to book.
Mr. Siddaramaiah accused Mr. Bommai of “lighting communal fires for political gains” and said that “true Hindus are intelligent enough to see through” him.
